Ex-Yugoslavia States Stamps

An interesting area for collecting stamps are the stamps issued by the states emerged after the disintegration of the state of Yugoslavia in the period from 1991. Un, until today and these are: Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Kosovo, Montenegro and Serbian Republic in Bosnia.

It is because the stamps are issued in a small editions of 4.000 to 50.000 pieces per edition. They were published in small editions not for commercial or speculative reasons, but because they are states with a small number of the population and the number of issued stamps is sufficient to meet the needs of postal service.

The majority of collectors give priority to unused series of stamps, but my opinion is that the stamps from above-mentioned areas are more interesting and more valuable when they are used ( with postmark) and when they are on the letter (especially editions of euro-cept). That is because they are rare and at the end only some were used.

Topics at these stamps are well designed and targeted and the actual making of the stamps is great and of quality.

My guess is that these stamps are a good investment and that every invested dollar worths. These stamps worth every penny!


BOSNIA REPUBLIKA SRPSKA "BRIDGES" edition 4444 pieces



MONTENEGRO "gastronomy" editions 5000 pieces



CROATIA "antic Nerona theater" editions 20000 pieces



REPUBLIKA SRPSKA BOSNIA "R letter from Banja Luka to Swiss with euro cept stamps"

Rafa, are you able to explain why some of these stamps don't make it into the Scott Catalogue? It has something to do with the stamps being for local use only ... or something like that. I don't understand even though I have read about it.

All stamps are regular stamps used in international traffic. Also, all stamps are in MICHEL catalog. I dont know why this stamps are not in Scott catalog.

I'll try to find an example. (I'm sorry I wasn't clear. I didn't mean the stamps you illustrated but some stamps from these states.)

No problem KGB , send me picture of these stamps and I wrighte about that, I collect stamps that are in catalog only. There are also cindarella, but this are not stamps!

Rafa, here's an example:



The caption given for this stamp--on the Web site for which I was doing research--is as follows:

This is an obligatory postal tax stamp that was used between December 1 and 31. The print run for this stamp was 500,000 stamps. Although Serbia was part of the Federal Republic of Yugoslovia in 2002, it was semi-autonomous and released a number of its own stamps. Because the stamp was only used in the region of Serbia rather than nationwide, it is not eligible for a Scott catalog number.

It is not regular post stamps and this stamp "privat charity edition" is not in catalog! Serbia stamps is from 2006. In 2002 Serbia is in Yugoslavia.

Also interesting, Croatian offical maximum card in period from 2005 to 2015 are edition only 500 pieces.

KGB - I've been collecting used copies of Croatia. You are correct that all the stamps are not yet in Scott, but you can easily find used copies of the unlisted stamps. It appears that Scott has not listed all of the "Postal Tax" stamps that have been released. I used the "Steiner" pages that follow the Scott catalog and have to add spaces for additional "Postal Tax" stamps. There are also some imperforate variations that are not listed in Scott.

Rafa - it's definitely an interesting collection of countries to collect. As you mentioned, the stamps are not produced in high numbers, and are generally water activated making them easy to soak from Kiloware :-)

Paul

Paul, thanks. What exactly does "postal tax" mean?

I agree Rafa, used stamps from these countries are more desirable.

I have most of the Slovenia stamps of the 1990's (used), but very few from the other countries.

Unfortunately Slovenia stamps are issued in big editions

http://www.inet.hr/~bepervan/

an excellent on-line resource for the Croatian charity postal tax issues, including the "un-official, non-obligatory" issues of 1997-2001.

[quote]Paul, thanks. What exactly does "postal tax" mean?[/quote}

to think of it in terms of US stamps, it is the added tax found on the old US "semi-postal" stamps. the US semi-postals would have 2 values (5c+2c), whereas the 5c was the actual postage and the 2c was a surcharge to fund a specific charity/organization/event. In Yugoslavia, the surcharge was issued as a separate stamp, to be added to the piece during it's obligatory use period. many of the Yugoslavian postal tax stamps are very abundant in mint condition, as people could just buy them as a means to support the charity/organization/event, and never actually use them (similar to the way US easter seals/ christmas seals are available en masse in mint condition)

For years, I have had a fascination with the postal tax stamps of Yugoslavia and ex-Yugoslav states.

http://yugoslaviastamps.blogspot.com/

just the beginning of my project, but I do hope to expand on it. I usually only have time to commit to it during the winter, as warmer weather brings yard/garden duties and expanded work hours at the factory.

Hi, in regard to the postal tax stamps of Yugoslavia, the short answer is in a note after RA54 (1977) in any Scott catalog. After that stamp, Yugoslavia issued tax stamps in small sets with varied "contribution rates" for the various constituent republics to support, say, cancer research, OR to support national charities. Scott only lists the national issues; calling the others locals. This leaves many valid, unlisted government-issued postal tax stamps out of Scott catalogs. Michel picks most up, SG does as well. They are not easy to locate.

The situation got dicier after the breakup when the postal tax stamps of Yugoslavia for use in Serbia are denominated "Serbia." Last time I looked, none of the catalogs picked up these. So you will find stamps like the one pictured by KGB that come from this era. These are not private charity stamps, but are legitimate government issued postal tax stamps, valid in Serbia only.

As each republic became its own country, their "local" postal tax stamps reappear in Scott. When Montenegro finally split from Serbia, the "local" Serbian postal tax stamps once again made it into Scott.

It appears postal tax stamps don't get completely covered by new issue dealers, so Scott is notoriously slow in listing them, this includes for Croatia, Slovenia and Macedonia, as well as Serbia. They get around to it eventually, though.

The best source for Yugoslavian postal tax stamps is a small catalog, now free on the web at: http://www.filatelija.net/katalozi.html, the Katalog Doplatnih Maraka M&M, which is unfortuantely in Serbo-Croatian but Google Translate does a good job on it if it is considered to be in Croatian.