Cross-border e-commerce is more dynamic (Online China)
With the approval of 27 cities and regions including Ordos and Yangzhou to establish cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zones, the number of cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zones in China has now reached 132.
As a new format of international trade, cross-border e-commerce has shown strong development vitality in recent years. Among them, the cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zone, which has been expanded several times, has played an obvious leading role in promoting the high-quality development of trade.
New engine of import and export trade
"Our company has an opportunity to achieve great development!" Sun Qing, general manager of Maanshan Mailang International Trade Co., Ltd., was both excited and full of longing after learning that the city where he was located was approved to set up a comprehensive pilot zone for cross-border e-commerce.
Previously, the company had to move warehouses and logistics offsite, and now they are preparing to move these operations back locally, which will save a lot of manpower and management costs.
"Next, we plan to open up the international market and improve our cross-border e-commerce business capabilities."
The cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zone is a pilot field for cross-border e-commerce in China. It usually refers to a comprehensive reform pilot zone that realizes the liberalization, facilitation and standardized development of cross-border e-commerce through institutional innovation, management innovation, and service innovation. Carry out pilot projects in terms of technical standards, business processes, supervision models and informatization construction of cross-border e-commerce transactions, payment, logistics, customs clearance, tax rebates, foreign exchange settlement and other aspects.
The State Council recently approved a new batch of cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zones, and 27 "new faces" including Ordos, Yangzhou, Zhenjiang, Jinhua, Ma'anshan, and Kashgar were on the list.
This is the sixth expansion of the comprehensive experimental area in the past seven years.
After this expansion, the number of China's cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zones has reached 132, covering 30 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities.
"In addition to the promotion of policy measures, some new changes in China's economy have provided strong support for the development of cross-border e-commerce." Lin Meng, director of the Modern Supply Chain Research Institute of the Ministry of Commerce Research Institute, said that consumption upgrading is the rapid development of cross-border e-commerce in China. The biggest driving force for growth, especially the continuous upgrading of consumption in third- and fourth-tier cities, has provided a lasting impetus for the development of cross-border e-commerce.
From a set of data, we can clearly see the obvious effect of the establishment of the cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zone: in 2014, China's cross-border online retail transaction volume was 449.2 billion yuan, and about 5,000 platforms and enterprises engaged in cross-border e-commerce.
By 2020, the import and export volume of cross-border e-commerce will reach 1.98 trillion yuan, and there will be more than 30,000 related enterprises engaged in cross-border e-commerce, and the number of registrations is still increasing year by year.
China's cross-border e-commerce has developed steadily and has become a new engine for import and export trade.
The expansion of the cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zone is conducive to responding to the impact of the new crown pneumonia epidemic and promoting the realization of the goal of "stabilizing foreign trade".
Encouraging the expansion of the cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zone, supporting it to carry out pilot projects, and making full use of the combination of online and offline channels is conducive to expanding the diversified market space and promoting the stability and improvement of foreign trade.
Businesses get real benefits
Hebei Defulai Trading Co., Ltd. has operated overseas warehouses in the United States for many years, and has a complete personnel structure and operation system.
Since Shijiazhuang did not have the qualification of a cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zone before, the company's business development was relatively slow.
In 2019, Shijiazhuang was approved to establish a comprehensive pilot zone for cross-border e-commerce.
As the infrastructure supporting the development of cross-border e-commerce, the Shijiazhuang cross-border e-commerce comprehensive public service platform operated by Hebei Guohe Investment Group Co., Ltd. has successfully helped enterprises to open up cross-border e-commerce export overseas warehouse business through active communication. to maintain an annual sales growth rate of 30%.
"After the establishment of the comprehensive pilot area and service platform, enterprises have truly felt the benefits and convenience." said Huang Tiecheng, general manager of Hebei Defulai Trading Co., Ltd.
With the help of the Shijiazhuang cross-border e-commerce comprehensive public service platform and the local customs, many local enterprises have successively opened up cross-border e-commerce B2B (business-to-business) direct export, export to overseas warehouses and other businesses through the integration of national customs clearance, which greatly expanded the Business development space.
According to Han Zhiwei, general manager of Hebei Guohe Investment Group Co., Ltd., the service platform currently integrates online import and export customs clearance, tax rebates and other government affairs services, links financial, logistics and other market services, and provides a full range of cross-border e-commerce and foreign trade enterprises. E-commerce import and export operation services have promoted industrial transformation and upgrading.
In order to make the cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zone play a greater role, various localities and departments have in-depth innovation and pilot testing, and have created nearly 100 supporting policies, allowing enterprises to enjoy convenience and dividends in logistics, payment, law, taxation, talents, etc. At the same time, it has accumulated a lot of experience that can be replicated and promoted.
For example, drawing on the exploration of Hangzhou, the cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zones in various regions have gradually established the basic framework of "two platforms and six systems".
The two platforms are the online comprehensive service platform and the offline industrial park platform; the six systems are the information sharing system, financial service system, intelligent logistics system, e-commerce integrity system, statistical monitoring system, and risk prevention and control system.
In the Chanba Free Trade Functional Zone of Xi'an Cross-border E-commerce Comprehensive Pilot Zone, the cross-border RMB settlement B2B comprehensive service platform "Tongsilu" has further improved the cross-border RMB receipt and payment experience and payment efficiency of settled enterprises.
"In the past, we used some third-party companies in coastal ports to do import trade. The settlement was complicated, the cycle was long, and there were still certain risks. After entering the platform, the 'one-stop' settlement of goods trade settlement is much more convenient." Shaanxi Wang Yan, general manager of Diyi Automation Technology Co., Ltd.
Effectively improve the consumer experience
A series of facilitation measures and preferential policies such as VAT exemption in the cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zone have not only benefited market players, but also improved consumer experience.
"I like the necklace in the shape of a ruby gourd very much. Seeing that the price is not expensive, I placed an order." On a cross-border e-commerce platform, Ms. Hu, a Beijing resident, recently selected many gifts from abroad for her family, "I don't want to go abroad now. You can buy international boutiques with affordable prices, a wide variety of quality assurance, and more choices, which are also very convenient.”
During the epidemic prevention period, the advantages of cross-border e-commerce have become more prominent, but they also face challenges such as tight global transportation capacity, rising transportation costs and low customs clearance efficiency.
Huo Jianguo, vice president of the China WTO Research Association, believes that the next step should be to improve the business rules and standards of cross-border e-commerce, including procurement, import and export standards, customs clearance procedures, and rules on agency fees; speed up the formation of overseas warehouse construction. To meet the standard requirements, expand the construction of overseas warehouses in an orderly manner, support qualified enterprises to speed up the construction of the logistics distribution system of overseas warehouses, and form a competitive advantage; encourage qualified enterprises to accelerate the development of digital trade and improve the competitiveness of trade.
The reporter learned that most of the cities that have recently been approved to establish cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zones have their own characteristic industries, such as coal in Ordos, ceramics in Jingdezhen, food in Chaozhou, aquatic products in Zhoushan, clothing and jewelry in Shanwei, etc.
How to combine these characteristic and advantageous industries with the policy reform advantages of the cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zone has become the focus of institutional innovation and expansion of development space in these places.
Cities that set up cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zones should fully combine local resource endowments and development characteristics, increase innovation in systems, businesses and models, and promote the realization of high-quality development of new foreign trade formats in a standardized manner.
Peng Xunwen