At present, China’s economic development is facing new problems such as shrinking demand, supply shock and weakening expectations (common problems when developing countries move towards developed countries). Digital economy, green low-carbon and common prosperity are the solutions. As the fastest-growing e-commerce, whether it is cross-border e-commerce, rural e-commerce or service e-commerce, it is very important to solve the three major problems.
As we all know, China’s e-commerce has a first mover advantage in the world and a strong first mover advantage compared with other fields in China. At present, although e-commerce still has room for development, it has reached another key node, that is, how to turn the first mover and first mover advantages into a force to help and guide, and drive the digitization of other relevant fields through radiation, so as to further expand the development space of e-commerce.
First, focus on trade negotiations and the implementation of measures, provide a good international environment for the development and innovation of cross-border e-commerce, and build a world-class cross-border e-commerce enterprise. As the world’s factory and foreign trade power, the share of cross-border e-commerce in foreign trade has considerable room for improvement. First of all, we should continue to deepen international cooperation, participate in the formulation of international rules for cross-border e-commerce, and explore new space for “Silk Road e-commerce” cooperation. It is suggested that the Ministry of commerce should take the lead to organize relevant departments to carry out in-depth research, further launch policies and measures conducive to the development of cross-border e-commerce, and speed up the study of the provisions related to cross-border e-commerce in cptpp; Secondly, we should pay close attention to the implementation of relevant provisions of RCEP involving cross-border e-commerce; Thirdly, support the “going out” of China’s e-commerce platform, encourage Chinese enterprises to build overseas warehouses and support the construction of digital marketing channels; The fourth is to carry out relevant activities, such as “Chinese brand going to sea” and holding global e-commerce conferences.
Second, take promoting consumption as the carrier, give play to the first mover advantage of e-commerce, take the digital intelligence of industrial and agricultural production and manufacturing, and form a digital economic system with a whole chain of consumer demand, production and manufacturing, R & D and design. At present, large-scale e-commerce platforms are involved in intelligent manufacturing. It is expected that consumption will lead research, design and production manufacturing. The compact digital economy chain can further improve efficiency, reduce costs and reduce waste. To comply with the trend of in-depth development of e-commerce, it is suggested that the commerce department take the lead in organizing relevant departments to carry out the pilot of new consumption manufacturing integration, explore the formation of new business models, production methods and economic organizations, and gradually promote them after gaining experience.
Third, take the large-scale cloud platform as the carrier and data and algorithms as the link to open up platforms such as e-commerce, industry, supply chain, R & D and design, so as to form a platform economic system. At present, large e-commerce enterprises have cloud service companies, and the data of small and medium-sized e-commerce companies are on cloud service companies. If industrial enterprises want to build digital factories, intelligent factories and industrial Internet platforms, their data should also be deployed on several cloud platforms. Therefore, cloud platform is the foundation of the platform. In the future, it will form platforms of all walks of life, large and small, and eventually evolve into platform economy. The leader of platform economy should be the platform entrance, and consumer e-commerce platforms may be the leaders of all kinds of platforms. Since cloud platform is the foundation and e-commerce platform is the leader, the large e-commerce platform with cloud platform should be the leader of platform economy. We should seize this opportunity, cultivate and expand leaders, drive and connect other platforms, and then form a platform economic system.
The combination of traditional industry and foreign trade is to build a digital industry cluster with the integration of Chinese traditional industry and foreign trade. The commodities suitable for e-commerce are civil products, and most of the data are produced by small and medium-sized enterprises. Most of China’s small and medium-sized enterprises exist in the form of massive industrial clusters because of their high efficiency and low cost. For example, the price of lighters in Wenzhou has remained unchanged for 30 years. These industries can only be upgraded by digitization and intelligence from manual production to mechanization and automation. Industrial clusters have fine division of labor, strong cooperation and group operations, forming a model of production, supply and marketing, purchase, sales and inventory, domestic and foreign trade and Wuxi Online Offline Communication Information Technology Co.Ltd(300959) integration. Therefore, we should focus on industrial clusters and jointly carry out integration pilot demonstration with relevant departments.
Fifth, take brand building as the carrier to build a number of famous e-commerce platforms, commodity and service brands to boost the construction of quality China. Brand is the focus of competition. China’s economy has moved from low-cost competition to innovation, quality and brand. As a new channel, e-commerce, especially cross-border e-commerce, provides new opportunities for building new brands. It is suggested to focus on platforms, goods and services and build a number of new brands through activity carriers such as “Chinese brand going to sea”, “quality e-commerce” and “time-honored e-commerce”.
Sixth, take digital life as the carrier to promote the digitization of life service industry and meet the people’s growing demand for a better life. At present, the digitization of government, business, medical treatment, education, elderly care, housekeeping and other digitization are being promoted. It is time to integrate the life service industry and promote its development. It is suggested to take digital life as the carrier, consider and arrange food, accommodation, travel, entertainment, shopping, schooling, employment and medical treatment, and unify the entrance, deployment, development and supervision, so as to facilitate the masses, reduce costs, form a brand and facilitate supervision.
Seventh, we should not only explore supervision methods, but also encourage innovative development and optimize the development ecology of e-commerce. As an important part of the digital economy, as a new thing and a first mover, e-commerce must have some problems after more than 20 years of development, especially the explosive growth in recent 10 years, and supervision needs to be strengthened. At the same time, we should see that innovation and development still need to be continued in this field, such as cross-border e-commerce, rural e-commerce, e-commerce in life service industry and e-commerce extending to the fields of production, life, service and management. Therefore, we should continue to optimize the development ecology of e-commerce, not “talk about e-commerce on e-commerce”, but look at e-commerce, export and development of e-commerce based on foreign trade, common prosperity, green and low-carbon, intelligent manufacturing and a better life.
(the author is the former first-class inspector of Zhejiang Department of Commerce)
