With the help of the Internet, 1.83 trillion yuan of products were sold from China to all parts of the world last year-cross-border e-commerce exports increased by 19.6%.

The Central Economic Work Conference put forward that "it is necessary to speed up the cultivation of new kinetic energy of foreign trade, consolidate the basic disk of foreign trade and foreign capital, and expand the trade of intermediate goods, service trade, digital trade and cross-border e-commerce." In recent years, cross-border e-commerce, as a new foreign trade format with the fastest development, the greatest potential and the strongest driving effect, has shown great market vitality and growth resilience, and has become a new bright color in the field of foreign trade.

According to customs estimates, in 2023, the total import and export volume of cross-border e-commerce in China was 2.38 trillion yuan, an increase of 15.6%. Among them, exports were 1.83 trillion yuan, an increase of 19.6%; Imports reached 548.3 billion yuan, up by 3.9%. The rapid development of cross-border e-commerce not only meets the diversified and personalized needs of domestic consumers, but also helps Chinese products reach the world and become an important kinetic energy for foreign trade development.

Cross-border e-commerce relies on a flexible, efficient and resilient supply chain to inject new impetus into global trade growth.

As night falls, the warehouse of cross-border e-commerce enterprises in the Comprehensive Bonded Zone (South Zone) of Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport, Guangdong Province is brightly lit. In the warehouse, thousands of cross-border e-commerce export commodities are packed according to orders, and after completing customs formalities, they will soon be transported to the airport and sent to consumers around the world on international flights.

With the in-depth development of globalization, more and more Chinese enterprises are turning their attention to overseas markets and seeking more development space. Cross-border e-commerce export is one of the important paths.

In 2023, the General Office of the State Council issued the Opinions on Promoting the Stable Scale and Excellent Structure of Foreign Trade, which proposed that "promoting the healthy and sustainable innovation and development of cross-border e-commerce" and "encouraging all localities to combine their industrial and endowment advantages to innovate and build a comprehensive cross-border e-commerce experimental zone, actively developing the" cross-border e-commerce+industrial belt "model, and driving cross-border e-commerce enterprises to export to enterprises".

Zhu Siqiao, an associate researcher at the Institute of International Trade and Economic Cooperation of the Ministry of Commerce, believes that under the circumstances of global trade uncertainty growth and trade downturn, cross-border e-commerce relies on flexible, efficient and resilient supply chains to provide more value-for-money products to global consumers, which has also injected new impetus into global trade growth.

In 2023, relevant departments continued to improve customs clearance, taxation, foreign exchange and other policies, innovated the supervision mode, and promoted enterprises to reduce costs and increase efficiency; Support cross-border e-commerce comprehensive test areas, industry organizations and enterprises to actively participate in the "Silk Road E-commerce" and jointly build the "Belt and Road" economic and trade cooperation, and help cross-border e-commerce exports to be stable and far-reaching.

Guangzhou Customs, in combination with the needs of enterprises, launched the supervision mode of "cross-border e-commerce export consolidation in special areas", which combined various types of e-commerce goods in the same consumer’s order into one package, went through exit customs clearance procedures, and promoted smooth cross-border e-commerce customs clearance 24 hours a day. In 2023, Guangzhou Baiyun Airport Customs has supervised the export of 346 million cross-border e-commerce goods, up 51.8% year-on-year.

Beijing Customs takes advantage of two international aviation hubs, Capital International Airport and Daxing International Airport, and carries out "continuous direct transfer" and "direct communication" in cross-border e-commerce export goods, realizing the linkage between the two hubs and greatly improving the circulation efficiency of cross-border e-commerce export goods.

"Through the cross-border e-commerce export overseas warehouse model, our independent brand has successfully established a foothold in foreign markets." Lv Qiang, general manager of Zhejiang Hangzhou Weilijie Travel Products Co., Ltd. said: "Not only is delivery and after-sales more convenient, but also the feedback from foreign consumers can be collected in time through the e-commerce platform to continuously optimize products." Since 2023, Weilijie Company has sold more than 20 million yuan of self-owned brand luggage through foreign cross-border e-commerce platforms, a year-on-year increase of more than 70%. Hangzhou Customs actively explores new modes of cross-border e-commerce development and applies new scenarios, supports traditional industries to expand overseas markets through new formats, and makes cross-border e-commerce overseas warehouses a "new station" for domestic products to go to sea.

Zhu Siqiao believes that the rapid development of digital technology and the promotion of regional cooperation will create a better environment for the development of cross-border e-commerce. It is suggested to continue to implement the various policies for stabilizing foreign trade that have been introduced. At the same time, in view of the new situation and new tasks, we will promote the introduction of new policies and measures in a timely manner, improve the industrial chain and ecological chain of cross-border e-commerce, and gradually form a series of management systems and economic and trade rules that adapt to and lead the development of global cross-border e-commerce, and further enhance the international competitiveness of cross-border e-commerce in China.

Drive the transformation of traditional manufacturing enterprises and trading enterprises and promote the development of new formats.

Recently, a batch of daily necessities exported by Shandong Qingdao Kairuixiang International Logistics Co., Ltd. were shipped at Qingdao Port and sent to overseas warehouses located overseas.

"We actively explore overseas markets for cross-border e-commerce for enterprises." Wang Xia, general manager of Kairuixiang Company, said that last year Kairuixiang Company declared cross-border e-commerce export for 1,000 tickets of goods from more than 80 enterprises, and the sales situation is still hot this year.

Based on the advantages of industrial base, Shandong has innovatively implemented the "cross-border e-commerce+industrial belt" cultivation project, so that more local high-quality products can sail out to sea. According to the statistics of Qingdao Customs, in the first 11 months of 2023, the import and export of new foreign trade formats in Shandong, including cross-border e-commerce, was 260.48 billion yuan.

Cross-border e-commerce links different industries, from clothing, shoes and hats, maternal and child products to large pieces such as furniture and home appliances. All walks of life can be linked to the global market through cross-border e-commerce. At the same time, cross-border e-commerce has driven the transformation of traditional manufacturing enterprises and trading enterprises, and promoted the development of new formats.

In China Nongchuanggang (Jining) Cross-border E-commerce Industrial Park located in Jining High-tech Zone, Shandong Province, garlic from Jinxiang County was favored by foreign merchants, and Shandong Jiongxin Trading Co., Ltd. signed a garlic order of 12,000 US dollars. "After entering the industrial park to develop cross-border e-commerce, the order profit rate has increased by 50% compared with before." Han Ju, general manager of Jiongxin Company, said.

In Shanghai, 147 cross-border e-commerce export packages were recently transported from Shanghai Qingpu Comprehensive Bonded Zone to Shanghai Pudong International Airport after going through the GPS customs clearance supervision procedures at Qingpu Customs, which belongs to Shanghai Customs. They will be transported abroad by freight flights and delivered directly to overseas consumers. Qingpu Customs and Pudong International Airport Customs work together to further optimize the supervision mode. At present, Qingpu District of Shanghai has attracted nine national or regional express delivery enterprise headquarters to settle in, and a cross-border e-commerce export industrial cluster has been initially formed in Qingpu West Area.

In Zhuhai, Guangdong, Gongbei Customs has actively helped to build a fast-track for cross-border logistics in Greater Bay Area, supported qualified export commodities to go through customs declaration procedures by means of "simplified declaration, check and release of lists, and summary statistics", and explored new routes for sea, land and air combined transport. It has attracted many enterprises such as SF Express, DHL and Cainiao to conduct e-commerce business at Zhuhai Highway Port of Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge, with export destinations reaching more than 200 countries and regions.

Optimize the regulatory system and release the new vitality of cross-border e-commerce trade

Recently, in the enterprise warehouse of Nansha Comprehensive Bonded Zone in Guangzhou, thousands of exported cross-border e-commerce garments returned due to mismatched sizes were re-tallied. After the cross-border e-commerce platform was re-purchased by overseas consumers in different regions, these returned export commodities were "packaged" together with the newly sold commodities and sent to Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport, and then sent to overseas markets.

With the rapid development of cross-border e-commerce, the online ordering and consumption mode of "fast fashion" retail goods such as fashionable clothes and clothing bags produced in China is widely favored by overseas consumers. However, due to the certain return rate of FMCG, the problem of "difficult return" in cross-border purchases has once become a problem that puzzles consumers and cross-border export enterprises.

Suzhou Customs, which belongs to Nanjing Customs, provides one-stop service in the whole process, optimizes the supervision system, establishes efficient, safe and convenient channels, solves the pain points of export enterprises, realizes the export and return of cross-border e-commerce products, and releases the new vitality of cross-border e-commerce trade.

Guangzhou Customs has innovated a one-stop supervision service mode for cross-border e-commerce export returns, allowing enterprises to return the returned goods of export e-commerce that meet the secondary sales conditions overseas to Nansha Comprehensive Bonded Zone, and complete unpacking, sorting, shelving, storage and re-export in one stop in the warehouse of Comprehensive Bonded Zone, thus solving the difficulties and pain points of cross-border e-commerce export returns. In 2023, Guangzhou Customs launched a cross-border e-commerce export return project, with the value of first-line returns exceeding US$ 240 million, and the number of "packaged" export parcels exceeding 31 million.

"Previously, in order to meet consumers’ return demand, we needed to set up overseas return warehouses in the Middle East, Europe, America and other places, which was costly. Nowadays, under the new mode of customs supervision service, cross-border e-commerce export parcels and return parcels can be’ packaged’ according to actual orders, saving a lot of logistics costs and warehousing and management costs for setting up warehouses overseas. " Jifang Ma, general manager of Guangzhou Pincheng Logistics Co., Ltd. said.

The relevant person in charge of the General Administration of Customs said that it will solidly promote the construction of the cross-border e-commerce comprehensive test area, continue to promote the innovative development of market procurement trade methods, promote cross-border e-commerce and other formats to promote each other and integrate development, continuously broaden trade channels, realize the integrated development of domestic and foreign trade, and help foreign trade maintain stability and improve quality. (Reporter Du Haitao)