Helping rural revitalization is undoubtedly the hot topic, focus and topic with the touchpoints of the times.
At the end of last year, the Party Central Committee and the State Council made arrangements and jointly launched a county-level commercial construction action with 16 departments. The commercial network of counties and below is the shortcoming and weakness of the entire circulation system of the mainland. In the context of urban-rural integration, as a technology company with a sense of social responsibility, it should give full play to the advantages of massive data and rich application scenarios, promote the deep integration of digital technology and the real economy at the county level, empower the transformation and upgrading of traditional formats in the county, and give birth to new industries, new formats and new models.
The 2022 Government Work Report mentions: "Promote the sustained recovery of consumption", "promote the deep integration of online and offline consumption, promote the recovery of life service consumption, and develop new consumption formats and models" and "strengthen the construction of the county commercial system, develop rural e-commerce and express logistics and distribution", "improve the quality of products and services, strengthen the protection of consumer rights and interests, and strive to adapt to the needs of the masses and enhance the willingness to consume". Local commercialization at the county level is an internal circulation and rural revitalization strategy jointly led by the Ministry of Commerce of the two sessions, led by the Ministry of Rural Agriculture, which is also in line with the general direction of "digital-real integration".
Focusing on the topic of "Digital Service Products Promote Rural Revitalization at the County Level", Tencent Research Institute, together with WeChat and Wei village, jointly held a seminar on new rural revitalization to explore how to smooth the development gap between urban and rural areas and regions through digital means and help rural revitalization.
Panelists:
Chen Jingjing is an expert of tencent's Sustainable Social Values Division (SSV) and a doctor of literature from Chinese Min University
Gu Haijun Tencent WeChat Business Group City Service Project Leader
Pan Dongming is the general manager of Zhejiang Chaijie E-commerce Co., Ltd
Expert of Enterprise Social Value Innovation Center of LiZi Tencent Research Institute
compere:
Chen Liyuan is a senior researcher at Tencent Research Institute
Policy Interpretation:
Look for a digital breakthrough in rural revitalization
Moderator: I would like to first ask Mr. Pan Dongming and Mr. Li Zi, from the perspective of policy interpretation, what are the breakthrough points of digital service products in the revitalization of county rural areas?
Li Zi: At present, to promote the domestic and international double cycle, for the internal cycle, consumption and employment is a very important direction, and the construction of the rural commercial system is also an important strategic fulcrum for smoothing the domestic cycle.
In this policy background, we raise two questions: First, what is the digitization of business in the county now? Second, as a digital technology company, how can digital products help rural revitalization and make efforts to achieve common prosperity?
With these two questions in mind, we went to the countryside and conducted field research. The first research site we chose was in Suichang County, Lishui City, Zhejiang Province. We found that local commercialization does have a dilemma. Although the sinking of e-commerce platforms has indeed built a more perfect logistics system and cultivated digital habits for the county, the emergence of these foreign platforms has caused a great squeeze on local businesses, such as the lack of digital operation capabilities, the difficulty of building a local distribution logistics system, and the lack of online marketing windows, etc. Digitalization may be the best way to help them stand out.
Figure 1:The research team visited local merchants in Suichang County
Digital products can meet the offline experiential consumption of local consumers, help physical stores drain flow, and accurately understand the needs of users. For those small and medium-sized merchants, with the help of these digital products, they can realize a series of transactions such as online settlement, operation, marketing, etc., optimize management, reduce costs and increase efficiency, and bring a large number of local employment. At the same time, it also enhances the economic vitality of the county and the countryside, and promotes the local commercial circulation.
Figure 2: An example of digitization of local agricultural products in Suichang
Secondly, from the aspect of digital government, strengthening the construction of digital infrastructure and improving the digitalization ability of rural government affairs can promote the modernization of rural governance; from the aspect of digital industry, relying on digital technology systems and product platforms, it can promote the digital development of agriculture and help the digital transformation of county township enterprises; from the aspect of digital services, improve the rural digital public service system, commercial service system, and innovate the way of public service supply, which can activate the vitality of rural market players.
Pan Dongming: In terms of empowering rural areas through e-commerce, the correlation between policies and the Ministry of Commerce or local commerce is particularly high, and looking back at the construction of the county rural commercial system in the past ten years, there are several important nodes.
First of all, from 2005 to 2013, the "Ten Thousand Villages and Thousands of Townships Market Project" promoted by the Ministry of Commerce transformed some traditional mom-and-pop stores into supermarkets and convenience stores. More typical is to dismantle many of the original counters more than one meter high and become a new type of business form that is relatively more open and convenient such as an open shelf.
In 2014, the Ministry of Commerce launched the digital transformation of "e-commerce into the countryside", which has made great improvements to the digitization, e-commerce and Internet + of rural commerce. Its core is to empower the rural and county economies through online e-commerce. From its launch in 2014 to 2021, there are about 1,700 counties, and each county has special funds ranging from 20 million to 40 million yuan for e-commerce into rural areas.
In 2021, we in Suichang are considered to be a relatively in-depth participant in the construction of the county commercial system, including the drafting of the "Guidelines for County Commercial Construction" and the relevant seminars held around the drafting of the guidelines.
From my understanding, the first round of rural traditional business transformation is for entities, the second round is for e-commerce, and the third round of county-level commercial system construction is a further integration of entities and e-commerce.
The current sinking market, with the county township as the main body, especially in the past two years, has suffered from a very large competitive pressure, with its own reasons and the sinking from external commercial platforms. The sinking of the platform has severely squeezed local businesses. It has caused the loss of tax revenues, eroded local employment, and formed a series of social problems.
To help the construction of the county's commercial system, it currently mainly includes two directions: hardware level and software level. The hardware level includes the construction of the main body of the business center, such as the logistics center, the business center, etc.; the software is the support of the platform, and the enterprise can develop one place at a time, but it is difficult to standardize. Therefore, we very much hope that Tencent, as a company with strong technology and a strong sense of social responsibility, can pay attention to the construction of digital services in the county business system and help the development of local commerce.
From our own practice, through online live broadcasting, mini programs, community group purchases and other forms, we have successfully sold many agricultural products, especially live broadcasts that tend to be localized and tend to private domain traffic, which is especially suitable for the construction of local business systems. In addition, the local small and micro enterprises in the county are the vitality of the county economy, and the use of digital tools can help them reduce costs and increase efficiency. At present, the scope of our service is still relatively limited, it is a small bonsai, not a landscape. How to put the power of Internet technology to better serve the sinking market, serve agriculture, and serve the county economy is currently a very good node.
Thinking "for the village"
Moderator: Tencent has been deeply involved in public welfare charity and social value innovation for many years, especially in 2021, it has put forward the strategy of sustainable social value innovation, I would like to ask Ms. Chen Jingjing, as a front-line participant of Tencent SSV (Sustainable Social Value) and an expert of the "For the Village" project, how do you think about the topic of county rural revitalization?
Chen Jingjing: SSV is the abbreviation of sustainable social value, our business department is called Tencent Sustainable Social Value Division, there is a goodness laboratory group under the business department, and our village development laboratory is a member of the goodness laboratory group, mainly committed to finding some new paths, new methods, new models and new methods for sustainable social value innovation in the rural field.
The strategic upgrade in 2021 is the fourth strategic upgrade in Tencent's 24-year history, and the core of this strategic upgrade is to promote sustainable social value innovation after taking root in the consumer Internet and embracing the industrial Internet.
On the one hand, the country's strategy is changing, and it is comprehensively promoting rural revitalization. On the other hand, As a company, Tencent has also come to a stage of a new strategic upgrade on its own development path, and it needs to take the innovation of social value as a stage of the strategic base of the entire group.
Since its establishment in April 2021, SSV has been thinking about the Village Development Lab: As a department that helps rural revitalization, what should we do, and how should we find the Tencent model to help rural revitalization?
We have now basically determined the principles and guidelines for this issue and summarized the three criteria for judging the problem.
In principle, we must adhere to three criteria: the first criterion is that we should closely follow the national strategy; the second criterion is that farmers benefit. We do all these things, the ultimate goal is for social value; the third is Tencent's advantage, in addition to the rural revitalization of the main body of independent efforts, we as an Internet technology company, what can we do for them?
Based on this standard, we have initially determined several key exploration directions: the first is the revitalization of rural talents, such as the "China Agricultural University Tencent for Villages and Rural CEO Program" that just opened in Shenzhen two days ago, targeted training of rural professional managers; the second is rural construction, we hope to cultivate rural talents in the vast rural areas, in all fields of rural construction; the third direction is to develop the characteristic breeding industry in the agricultural industry; and finally, to develop cutting-edge agricultural science and technology. Tencent has always attached great importance to the help of science and technology, and the same is true in the agricultural field.
Construction of digital ecological services
Moderator: Regarding the digital service ecology, as a front-line practitioner in the county, a deep participant in the weChat team urban service industry, and an industry expert, what kind of ecological service construction do you think can be used to reduce the gap between urban and rural areas in the field of commercial services and public services?
Gu Haijun: The main products of the WeChat open platform are two, one is the public account, including the subscription account service account, and the other is the mini program, I am mainly responsible for the industry operation in this team, the focus is in the field of government affairs and people's livelihood, including some scenarios of some social services.
In the past two years, with the help of digital products, the government's public services have been sinking, and public service mini programs such as "Guangdong Province" and "With the Application" have sunk to the countryside, and "Guangdong Province" not only serves the economically developed Pearl River Delta region, but also covers remote areas of Guangdong Province.
Now, the service account and mini program of The WeChat open platform have solved many government affairs problems through digital means. For example, social security payment, WeChat Mini Program has helped 80 million elderly people solve the problem of social security payment, most of which are rural elderly people, they will not use it themselves, but can be operated by the staff to pay on behalf of the staff, completing some of the headaches in the past.
From a business point of view, service accounts and mini programs have also been widely accepted by everyone. Now there are nine million stores and catering stores in the country, of which there are about 5 million small restaurants, guiding them to use small programs to scan codes to order food and WeChat receipts can also improve operational efficiency.
Mini programs can also help community group purchase sinking. In China's business system, there are seven million mom-and-pop shops, of which two million are in the county, helping these mom-and-pop shops to improve their business capabilities can effectively improve the service level of county business.
The practice of the continuous deep sinking of the open platform has effectively solved a series of real problems related to people's livelihood, including (social security, pension, medical insurance, Internet court, and convenience for the elderly). Then, further exert the ability of WeChat scenes and the ability of digital convenience (mini programs) to continuously reduce the imbalance between urban and rural development.
Pan Dongming: The main business entities in the county are mainly wholesalers, some large franchise stores, and traditional commercial operators. Online is a very important part of them at present, and what is needed behind the online is the support of the platform.
I have my own commercial physical store in the county, and the online live broadcast of agricultural products has also been carried out, connecting with consumers through small programs and WeChat groups to achieve precision marketing and after-sales service feedback. To revitalize the business of the county, it first needs the support of the platform, and the technical support of standardization is needed behind it. County-level commercial enterprises have local advantages, and when they make up for the shortcomings of digitalization and logistics distribution, they can resist external competitive pressures.
Social services at the commercial level may be the largest charity, and there are solutions at the technical level, platform level or live broadcast tools, and socially responsible technology companies can help the Ministry of Commerce and the State Council to help promote this matter from the perspective of the construction of the financial and commercial system.
After so many years (front-line work), the industry is important, but in fact, what is really related to the people, related to employment, related to entrepreneurship, and related to daily life of chai rice oil and salt is actually local commerce. If a place's businesses collapsed, it would be tens of thousands of people out of work, and the impact on all aspects of tax revenue would be great.
Li Zi: I think the two teachers just now talked very comprehensively. First, the entire product ecology of WeChat, in fact, is public service plus business, is really to make up for the service gap brought about by the infrastructure between urban and rural areas; second, thousands of county enterprises, are the pioneers of local traditional business, how can our digitalization quickly empower them, as a tool at the same time, the formation of standardized products, the construction of local ecological service system, the construction of service provider ecology, and finally the realization of internal circulation, supporting the production and life needs of our people. This could also be a huge socially responsible innovation.
Digital service products help rural revitalization
Moderator: The last question I would like to ask all the experts and teachers here, what kind of digital products do you think can achieve our rural revitalization?
Pan Dongming: I hope that Internet technology companies can shift more attention from big cities to local counties, hope to start from the perspective of public welfare, explore ways to combine with business, and hope that the products of technology companies and Tencent products can provide new support for the business of county townships and rural areas.
Chen Jingjing: We do rural revitalization, there is a 20-word policy: government-led, social co-creation, Tencent help, pilot demonstration, classification promotion.
I hope that in the future, whether it is from the agricultural primary production, secondary production and tertiary production, public services or commercial service industries, etc., from different dimensions, agricultural dimensions, rural dimensions, farmers' personal development dimensions, etc., we can use the county as a framework to do more and more accurate analysis. On the basis of accurate analysis, we will make more targeted digital services.
Gu Haijun: The Mini Program has a few more days, which is exactly five time points. We have a good base of coverage and public services at the head or in the city. However, in the vast, so-called mid-rise or more sinking area, it is still relatively blank. So I've been thinking about calling on our service providers, calling on our partners, to come with us to pay attention to this issue.
We hope to explore with the practitioners in the frontline of the county, and we are very willing to help the people, help the county residents and villagers to obtain better digital services, and hope to help service providers realize their own business value.
Our open platform has a slogan: even the smallest individual has its own brand. I hope that more capabilities can be exported to everyone to help the transformation of the digital economy in counties and rural areas and play our due role.
Li Zi: I hope that when we get together this time, we can really solve employment for counties and villages in the future, solve better consumption, and create opportunities for them to continue to start a business and innovate continuously. Small and micro enterprises such as local wholesale retailers in the county are the vitality of the county economy. As early as 2020, Tencent launched the TAPD small and micro enterprise support program, which aims to help small and micro enterprises tide over the difficulties of transformation in the post-epidemic era. At present, the digital transformation of the new county-wide local business is an important entry point for us as a digital enterprise to participate in the national strategy and join the rural revitalization. In fact, now that there is a great spark in the local area, how to burn the plains in the future, we can refuel together.