SHANGHAI: China has seen a rise in cross-border e-commerce trade, with turnover rising 80.6 per cent to 90.24 billion yuan last year over 2016. The average annual growth rate for the past three years is more than 50 per cent, said Yu Guangzhou, head of China’s General Administration of Customs (GAC) recently at the first Global Cross-Border E-commerce Conference in Beijing.
China’s e-commerce exports increased by 41.3 per cent to 33.65 billion yuan last year, while imports rocketed by 116.4 per cent to 56.59 billion yuan.
Chinese customs handled 660 million manifests for e-commerce trade in the past year, 8.4 times as much as for conventional imports and exports, a Chinese news agency reported cited Yu as saying.
Around 220 countries and regions were covered by China’s cross-border e-commerce network as of 2016.
GAC International Department director Zhao Ruxia said the conference would be held once every two years to facilitate global customs cooperation.
Deals made through e-commerce platforms often involve small orders and target end-consumers, posing new challenges to customs control. To address the issue, the World Customs Organization (WCO) has set up an e-commerce working group to develop international standards.
