Policy support for cross-border e-commerce trillion market space is emerging

Due to the epidemic, the high growth rate of 52.8% has become a new indication that China's cross-border e-commerce is growing against the trend. Estimates show that the overall scale of China's cross-border e-commerce retail export has exceeded 1 trillion yuan, and the global cross-border e-commerce transaction scale is expected to reach 12.7 trillion yuan in 2020, which will continue to maintain a high growth rate in the future.

The concentrated outbreak of the market cannot be separated from the national policy support. Since the beginning of this year, China has taken multiple measures to promote the development of cross-border e-commerce, from the expansion of comprehensive trial zones for cross-border e-commerce, to the introduction of new regulations on customs supervision, to the implementation of suggestions on the innovation and development of foreign trade, to the signing of RCEP. The reporter of Economic Information Daily has learned that relevant departments and the comprehensive test area of cross-border e-commerce are currently studying specific measures to promote the implementation of the above good news, among which many industrial chains such as cross-border payment, e-commerce platforms and logistics companies are expected to gain more good news.

Rapid growth against the trend

Trillion market space is available

In the face of the severe impact on global foreign trade as a whole, the import and export volume through the cross-border e-commerce management platform of customs rose by 52.8% in the first three quarters of this year, reaching 187.39 billion yuan, becoming an important force in stabilizing China's foreign trade.

The recently released Blue Book on Cross-border E-commerce: Report on The Development of China's Cross-border E-commerce (2020) (hereinafter referred to as the Report) points out that China's cross-border e-commerce market is ushering in a new period of rapid development opportunities, and is expected to reach 280 billion yuan by 2020, continuing to achieve leapfrog growth.

At the same time, the market analysis points out that besides the statistical dimension, the cross-border e-commerce market scale of China has already exceeded the level of one trillion. Not only is the Chinese market growing rapidly, but the cross-border e-commerce space is also opening up rapidly around the world. The report pointed out that the global cross-border e-commerce transactions are expected to reach 12.7 trillion yuan in 2020, and will continue to grow at a high speed in the future.

According to eMarketer, global online retail sales will reach $6.5 trillion by 2023, accounting for 22% of total global retail sales of consumer goods.

According to the analysis, cross-border e-commerce has become an important way to connect Chinese manufacturing with global consumption. Its development is still in its infancy and there is still a huge market space to be explored.

Huang Qifan, a distinguished professor at Fudan University and academic adviser to the China Finance 40 Forum, said that despite the rapid growth, the total amount is still small. By the end of 2019, the total transaction volume of cross-border E-COMMERCE B2C is 170 billion yuan, which adds up to about 25 billion US dollars, accounting for less than 1% of China's total import and export trade of more than 4 trillion US dollars.

"From this perspective, the potential of cross-border e-commerce has not been fully unleashed." Huang predicted that by 2035, 50 percent of foreign trade is expected to be completed through cross-border e-commerce.

With the advent of global economic integration and digital economy, cross-border e-commerce has become a bright spot and an important driving force for the growth of foreign trade and will continue to grow at a high speed, Hong Yong, an associate researcher with the E-commerce Research Institute of the Ministry of Commerce, told Economic Information Daily.

Concentrated landing of good

Drive the industry to develop faster

The rapid growth of the market is inseparable from the support of national policies. Since the beginning of this year, China's cross-border e-commerce has ushered in many breakthroughs. In the first half of this year, The State Council approved the establishment of 46 comprehensive pilot zones for cross-border e-commerce, increasing the total number of such zones to 105. Subsequently, the General Administration of Customs added 9710 and 9810, which respectively correspond to cross-border e-commerce B2B and overseas warehouse modes.

The recent big positive has followed. On November 9, The General Office of the State Council issued the Implementation Opinions on Promoting The Innovative Development of Foreign Trade, which made it clear that cross-border e-commerce and other new forms of business should be promoted. On November 15, the signing of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) further opened up the room for market growth.

Statistics show that in 2019, the 15 RCEP member countries have a total population of about 2.27 billion, a GDP of 26 trillion US dollars, and a total export volume of 5.2 trillion US dollars, both accounting for about 30% of the global total.

Ministry of Commerce of China international electronic commerce center dean Li Mingtao in an interview with the economic information daily, reporter, said the RCEP framework, reduced tariffs on goods and investment threshold and financing facilitation, cross-border data flows, and consumer rights and interests protection rules of uniformity, will further promote the online market factors such as flow, thus stimulates the release of huge market potential.

It is worth noting that in order to further seize the opportunity of cross-border e-commerce development, policy support is still increasing. Pan Cheng, director of the department of Policies and Regulations under the General Administration of Customs, told Economic Information Daily that innovation in customs supervision has provided strong support for the development of cross-border e-commerce since the beginning of this year. Going forward, the Customs and relevant departments will continue to promote the improvement of the business environment such as customs clearance facilitation, and provide support for the pilot development such as the comprehensive trial zone for cross-border e-commerce with more systems.

The Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) said it will actively promote the inclusion of qualified cities in the pilot project for cross-border e-commerce retail import, and support enterprises to jointly build and share overseas warehouses. We will continue to support the innovation of business models by various entities through policies and measures such as expanding the supply of export credit, so as to add impetus and vitality to the development of cross-border e-commerce. We will continue to deepen international cooperation and take an active part in the formulation of international rules for cross-border e-commerce.

In Li Mingtao's opinion, the introduction of the policy of continuous support has provided a stable expectation of policy environment for China's cross-border e-commerce enterprises, and significantly promoted the improvement of confidence in the development of the industry. At the same time, with the arrival of good news one after another, the attraction of the sunshine channel for cross-border e-commerce will be continuously enhanced to guide the standardized development of cross-border e-commerce.

We will actively explore new platforms for innovation

We will promote the coordinated development of industrial chains

The rapidly rising market combined with national policy support has further strengthened the confidence of all regions in developing cross-border e-commerce. The reporter learned from hangzhou Comprehensive Test Zone of cross-border e-commerce that the zone will further give play to the first-mover advantage of the first comprehensive test zone of cross-border e-commerce, support payment institutions to develop cross-border payment business, actively play the role of bank card clearing license, and develop diversified payment and clearing services. We will support the development of cross-border e-commerce platforms and encourage traditional trading and manufacturing enterprises to expand cross-border e-commerce applications. We will accelerate the building of a global intelligent logistics hub, explore new "Internet + port" services, and give full play to the role of cainiao, SF Express, YTO and other headquarters (bases) to build a comprehensive logistics industry chain system integrating land, sea, and air transportation, port services, distribution and transfer, bonded warehousing, and express delivery.

This is just a microcosm of the development of cross-border e-commerce in different regions. The reporter learned that innovative portals such as the comprehensive trial zone for cross-border e-commerce, the pilot free trade zone, all kinds of bonded zones and Hainan Free Trade Port are actively promoting the development of cross-border e-commerce, among which the exploration of cross-border payment, the development of e-commerce platforms and the construction of cross-border logistics have become the focus of exploration.

Hong Yong pointed out that the promotion of various construction will benefit the upstream and downstream of the industry chain at the same time, and play a synergistic promoting effect on the development of the whole industry. "With the continuous optimization of the ecological environment of cross-border e-commerce, its penetration rate in international trade will be higher and higher, and the transaction scale and user scale will continue to grow." He said.

Li mingtao believes that in the future, with the continuous improvement of global logistics, payment and trade facilitation conditions and the acceleration of global digitization process, cross-border e-commerce is facing a greater period of development opportunities.

Li pointed out that there are still many links to be improved in the development of cross-border e-commerce. For example, policy coordination in the field of cross-border e-commerce should be strengthened. He further pointed out that the comprehensive trial area of cross-border e-commerce can be used to refine the implementation details of various policies in the field of cross-border e-commerce and unify the implementation standards, so that enterprises can truly enjoy the policy dividends of the state in the aspects of tax, foreign exchange settlement and customs clearance.