In 1853, forces of the Taiping Rebellion captured Nanking and approaching Shanghai, the Superintendent of Customs in Shanghai, Wu Chen-Chang ran for his life and business was interrupted. Under this circumstance, the consuls of Great Britain, United States of America and France in Shanghai discussed to set up a new customs system.

The new western customs system was founded in Shanghai on 12th July, 1854, and had become the origin of the modern Chinese customs system that still existing in Taiwan today. Although representatives of foreign administrations were appointed as Inspector of Customs to play the role of advisors, in fact they exercised the real power in the service.

The new customs system brought benefits to both foreign businessmen and to the Ching Government due to its high efficiency. In 1858, the monopoly of the Chinese customs was turned over to British hands under the ‘Treaty of Tientsin’ and Horatio Nelson Lay, who, at the age of 27, had already been an Inspector of Customs for four years, became the Inspector-General of the Imperial Chinese Customs Service.

After the resignation of Horatio Nelson Lay, Robert Hart was appointed as new Inspector-General of the Imperial Chinese Customs Service at the age of 28. He served in this position for nearly 48 years.

Hart made a huge contribution to the expansion of China’s customs service. When he took the office, there were only thirteen foreign customs officers in the service, but by 1888 there were 678. In addition, the customs service also expanded to the borders with Hong Kong, Macao, and Korea, and to the border of Yunnan Province. The Tamshui Customs and the Keelung Branch were also established in Taiwan in 1863.

During Hart’s term of office, the Customs Service was in charge of customs affairs, foreign affairs, diplomatic affairs, tariff collection, statistics, port dredging, quarantines, management of lighthouses, and weather forecast. Hart also helped China to establish its first postal service system. Hart was deemed as the number one foreign advisor of China due to the contributions he made.

There were about 20,000 personnel in the Chinese Customs Service at the time when Hart passed away, 1,400 of whom were foreigners.

As the financial system was never united during the early Republican era, the Chinese government needed to borrow money from sources outside of China and the stable tariff collection was used as collateral.

The government was unable to exercise control over the imposition and collection of tariffs as the Inspector-General of the Chinese Maritime Customs Service was required to deposit the revenue derived from the tariffs to foreign banks. This situation gave rise to the appeal among the Chinese people of the need for autonomy in the management of tariffs and it also became one of the main goals of the National Government. After the unification of China under the National Government, the Customs Service ceased to hire foreigners. In December 1930, the National Government promulgated the ‘Customs Tariff Rules,’ which overturned the unequal treatment of China in tariffs since the ‘Treaty of Nanking’ in 1842. The Customs Agency was established under the Ministry of Finance and the entire tariff collected was to be deposited in the Central Bank of China for national use.

The Customs Service was interrupted during the war against Japan because most of the Chinese ports were under Japanese occupation. In 1949, Lester Knox Little, the American Inspector-General of the Chinese Maritime Customs Service, followed the government to Taiwan along with other twelve members of the ROC Customs Service. The customs service was expanded in the 1960s, as the trade between Taiwan and other countries increased. Before being transformed into the Directorate-General of Customs, Ministry of Finance in 1990, the Chinese Maritime Customs Service had departments including the Department of Tax Collection, Department of Tariffs, Department of Inspection and Seizure, Department of Statistics, Department of Maritime Business, the Secretariat, Department of Accounting, and Department of General Affairs. New departments now also include the Data Control Center, the Assessment Center, the Legal Affairs Office, the Planning Office, the Personnel Office, the Supervisory Office, the Appeals Screening Committee and the Tax Nomenclature Committee.

The main tasks of the R.O.C Customs today are to take charge of tariff collection, the inspection of commodities, the maintenance of statistics on imports and exports, the management of navigational safety aids, as well as to act as a substitute for tax fee collection, foreign trade control and other selected business.

In order to preserve the history of the Chinese Customs Service, the Ministry of Finance set up a Chinese Customs Museum located on the first and second floors of 13, Ta-Cheng Street, Taipei City where there is a large collection of artifacts representing the history of the customs including various items of interest from amongst impounded goods.