Industry and Trade Departments created under the Ministry of Finance

5 (17) June 1900 within the Ministry of Finance were simultaneously formed Industry and Trade Departmens.

Reform of such sectors as trade and industry, began in the era of Peter I. With that end in view the monarch created the Collegium of Commerce, the Collegium of Manufactures, and the Collegiums of Mining. From 1802, after the establishment of eight Ministries, the affairs of trade and industry were in the hands of: the Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of Finance. Nine years later, as a result of Speransky’s reform, in 1811, the Ministry of Commerce was abolished, and its affairs were given over to the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, where the Department of Internal Trade and Manufactures was founded. October 26 (November 7) 1864 Department of Manufacture and Internal Trade was renamed into the Department of Trade and Manufactures. From 5 (18) June 1900 the Departments of Industry and Trade were part of the Ministry of Finance, and from October 27 (November 9) 1905 – a part of the Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTiP).

Department of Industry was one of the major bodies of the Ministry in charge of   industrial affairs (except mining). It controlled the arrangement and maintenance of industrial enterprises, oversaw the modernization of factories, the Customs Tariff, the artistic and industrial exhibitions, and the Protection of Industrial Property Rights.

The Department included: 1st factory division; 2nd customs tariff division; office work of the Committee on technical affairs; clerical work of the General Office on factory and metallurgical affairs; Inspectorate Division; Division of Industrial Labor, Division of Accident Insurance; Special war-time clerical work; the Committee for the manufacturing industry; the Customs and tariff Committee, Procurer Committee.

During the war of 1914-1917 the Department wa in charge of: promoting of supply of raw materials, fuel and transportation to enterprises; metallurgy affairs in connection with the establishment of limit prices; affairs concerning the opening of factories in Petrograd and Moscow, about the creation of private plants manufacturing explosives and their supervision; affairs on foreign orders of equipment in private industry; on permits for importation of materials and machines from abroad.

In July 1917, the Department underwent a reorganization.  Three boards were established within it, which in their turn, included 15 structural parts.

October 26 (November 8), 1917 the Department of Industry was taken over by the People's Commissariat of Trade and Industry (NKTiP).

The Department of Trade was a state body in charge of administering internal and external trade, and overseeing their implementation. At the establishment, it was entrusted with the issues of internal trade: fairs, markets, rights of the merchant class, trade associations and corporations, on weights and measures, the state tax on trade, on charges of trafficking and crafts; of external trade relations (except for issues of Customs and Quarantine and Customs Department, the merchant societies and trade boards).

From the moment of establishment the Department included: The Boards of Weight and Measures, The Special Office for tax on trade.

From August 1914 the Department also considered the cases of war time; on measures to facilitate barter between the Allied Powers; on measures to combat the dominance of the enemy in the neutral countries; measures in regard of subjects of enemy states; issues related to a possible beginning of peace negotiations and post-war period.

September 19 (October 2), 1917 by a Resolution of the Provisional Government, the Department of Trade was abolished replaced by the newly formed as a part of MTiP Domestic Trade Division and Foreign Trade Division.

Lit.: Андерсон М. С. Пётр Великий. Ростов н/Д., 1997; Высшие и центральные государственные учреждения России 1801—1917. Т. 2. СПб., 2001. С. 174—178, 178—180; Горфейн Г. Из истории образования Министерства торговли и промышленности // Очерки по истории экономики и классовых отношений в России к. XIX — н. XX вв. М.; Л., 1964; Кулишер И. М. История русской торговли и промышленности. Челябинск, 2003; Сенин А. С. Министерство торговли и промышленности // Отечественная история. Энциклопедия. Т. 3. М., 2000.