"Now cross-border e-commerce has become a 'dark horse' in foreign trade, which is unstoppable. The current development of cross-border e-commerce is reflecting the three characteristics of the 'dark horse': fast speed, large volume, and sufficient stamina. ”
Recently, at a seminar with the theme of "Discussion on the High-quality Development Path of Platform Economy under the Wave of Digital and Real Integration", Wei Jianguo, former Vice Minister of the Ministry of Commerce and Vice Chairman of the China Center for International Economic Exchanges, said that the rapid rise of cross-border e-commerce platforms has become a highlight of the development of the platform economy in recent years and has attracted wide attention.
▲ Photo by Zhang Xiangcheng at the seminar on the high-quality development of the platform economy
In recent years, the mainland platform economy has developed rapidly, and its development status has been described by Wei Jianguo with the term "galloping of ten thousand horses". At present, the platform economy is undergoing profound changes in demand, technology, industry, power, competition and other aspects. China Economic Net held a seminar this time, inviting a number of experts, scholars and business representatives to discuss how to promote the high-quality development of the platform economy, enhance the international competitiveness of platform enterprises, and accelerate the innovation of platform governance. During this period, the phenomenon of "going to sea" of platform enterprises represented by Duoduo cross-border aroused the attention and heated discussion of the experts present.
"The strong growth of cross-border e-commerce has played an important role in stabilizing the scale and optimizing the structure of mainland foreign trade this year. Liu Shijin, former deputy director of the Development Research Center of the State Council, believes that China's economy is undergoing a factor-driven shift to innovation-driven, and platform enterprises and large-scale science and technology backbone enterprises should be allowed and encouraged to invest boldly and actively innovate to participate in the construction of national key projects.
China's cross-border e-commerce: the world's fastest growth rate is expected in the next five years
In recent years, the development of cross-border e-commerce has once again demonstrated China's speed. According to public data, the proportion of cross-border e-commerce in the import and export of goods in mainland China has increased from 1% in 2015 to 5% in 2022. From January to September this year, the import and export volume of cross-border e-commerce reached 1.7 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 14.4%, accounting for 5.5% of the import and export of goods trade in the same period. For example, the import and export volume of cross-border e-commerce in Shenzhen from January to October exceeded 200 billion yuan in the whole of last year, a year-on-year increase of 76.48%, and Guangdong's cross-border e-commerce import and export volume from January to October reached 736.6 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 47%.
In the past "Black Friday", Liu Wenhai, a merchant who runs a hat business, sold more than 1 million hats through Duoduo cross-border, and the sales of hats in the store exceeded 100,000 on the day of the "Black Friday" promotion alone. "There are 7-8 models that were sold out one day after 'Black Friday', and because the winter will last for several months, there is still a demand for hats, and I am mobilizing raw materials in various places, stepping up production, and filling the inventory. ”
In the past five years, the export scale of China's cross-border e-commerce has increased by 17 times, and the number of domestic cross-border e-commerce entities has reached 101,000 this year. Wei Jianguo said, "Unlike Google, Amazon and other platforms, the fast-growing Chinese cross-border e-commerce platform not only exports the 'new three' foreign trade in the east, but also sends those products in the central and western regions that have no opportunity to be displayed at the Canton Fair directly to the front line of the international market." ”
Taking Pinduoduo's Duoduo cross-border as an example, in just over a year, it has penetrated into more than 100 manufacturing industrial belts in Guangdong, Zhejiang, Shandong, Anhui, Henan, Hebei and other places, and promoted high-quality manufacturing products into more than 40 countries and regions such as North America, Australia, Europe, and Asia. At present, Duoduo cross-border exports more than 400,000 parcels per day, with an average daily cargo weight of about 600 tons.
▲ The scene of the Duoduo cross-border booth at the 2nd Global Digital Trade Expo. Photo by Zheng Yu▕
Wang Lei, vice president of Pinduoduo, who participated in the seminar as a representative of the enterprise, said that our original intention of designing this business is to reduce the burden on small and medium-sized foreign trade enterprises and open up a "full-link" cross-border channel for them. "As long as the manufacturing plant focuses on the core manufacturing, brand management, R&D and design, and returns to its own duties, it can easily embrace the global market. ”
"At present, China's cross-border e-commerce is becoming more and more obvious, and it is expected to become the fastest growing field in the world in the next five years, and form a three-legged pattern with general trade and processing trade in China's exports. Wei Jianguo believes that innovation, openness and green are the core of the high-quality development of cross-border e-commerce, and they should be implemented from these three aspects.
Huang Qunhui, director of the Institute of Economics of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, believes that in the face of a new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation, it is necessary to improve the support capacity for the high-quality development of scientific and technological innovation, especially in the face of the new challenges posed by the development of digital technology to the internal unified grasp of innovative development and green, coordinated and shared development, and to create a high-quality development model driven by the digital economy with high efficiency and inclusiveness.
Small and medium-sized enterprises stand on the international stage
Innovation is one of the core keywords for cross-border e-commerce to lead foreign trade into a new stage. According to Wang Jian, director of the Department of International Business and Economic Cooperation at the University of International Business and Economics, China's cross-border e-commerce innovation is reflected in model innovation, business innovation, policy innovation, and regulatory innovation.
"Compared with the changes in the global market in the past 20 years, we find that in the past, domestic enterprises going out were mainly large enterprises, but now, many small enterprises have entered the global market. The platform of Duoduo cross-border has gathered thousands of small, medium and micro enterprises. The most important innovation behind this is the full custody model, which lowers the threshold for small and medium-sized foreign trade enterprises to go global. Wang Jian believes that the widespread participation of small and medium-sized enterprises in global trade is the most important change in the current global market changes.
In September last year, Duoduo Cross-border launched innovative models such as "full custody" and "flexible supply" to help Chinese manufacturing directly connect with overseas consumers. Since then, other domestic cross-border e-commerce platforms have followed suit. As one of the earliest cross-border e-commerce platforms in China to fully implement the integrated service model, Duoduo Cross-border provides merchants with one-stop services including website drainage, cross-border logistics, intellectual property rights, etc., simplifying the process of going overseas, lowering the threshold for foreign trade, and broadening order channels.
"The difference between doing cross-border in the past and doing cross-border through full custody now is like a table of multiplication formulas for high numbers and ninety-nine. Liu Wenhai is so analogous.
According to Hu Qimu, deputy secretary-general of the China Digital and Real Integration 50 Forum and chief researcher of the digital economy think tank, Pinduoduo's deep penetration into the supply chain and its investment in the construction and improvement of public infrastructure may seem like a "sunk cost", but in fact it will help optimize the supply of the platform and further stimulate the release of consumption potential.
"To a certain extent, Duoduo cross-border is a useful attempt to smooth the domestic and international dual circulation. Chen Wenling, chief economist of the China Center for International Economic Exchanges, said that taking the United States as an example, Pinduoduo's main station combines some American goods with China's market demand, and cross-border business combines Chinese-made goods with the American market. "This kind of online connection plays a great role in building a new development pattern that promotes domestic and international dual circulation. ”
To further create new advantages of cross-border e-commerce, Chen Wenling believes that the mainland's advantages in manufacturing, talent, innovative technology into application scenarios, and digital infrastructure can be fully combined. "This advantage has created the foundation and conditions for us to form an international platform for cross-border e-commerce, and we can create and surpass the influence and radiation of international platforms such as Amazon in the future, which is the ability to create international, market-oriented, social, digital and intelligent circulation. ”
Through the development of enterprises, Wei Jigang, deputy director and researcher of the China International Development Knowledge Center of the Development Research Center of the State Council, observed that the cross-time and spatial effects of the platform economy make it face increasing international, regional and industrial ecological competition. Platforms are increasingly becoming an important part of national competitiveness. He believes that in order to promote the high-quality development of the platform economy as a whole, it is necessary to have a global vision, strategic thinking, and a sense of innovation, closely follow the national conditions, coordinate development and security, and coordinate the domestic and international markets.