Image Source : Visual China

BEIJING, June 26 (TMTPost) —— The import and export scale of cross-border e-commerce in China exceeded 2 trillion yuan ($276 billion) for the first time in 2022, an increase of 7.1% over 2021, according to the report released by the General Administration of Customs (GACC) during the 2023 China Langfang International Economic and Trade Fair.

The United States imported 34.3% of China's cross-border e-commerce exports, and Britain imported 6.5%. Japan exported 21.7% of China's total cross-border e-commerce imports, and the United States exported 17.9%. Consumer goods accounted for 92.8% of the exported goods while clothing, shoes, and bags for 33.1%, and cell phones and other electronic products for 17.1%. As for imports, consumer goods accounted for 98.3% of the imported goods, beauty products, and toiletries accounted for 28.4%, and food and fresh seafood accounted for 14.7%.

Lv Daliang, spokesman and director of the Department of Statistics and Analysis of General Administration of Customs said that in recent years, China's cross-border e-commerce has seen rapid growth, with great potentials to be released against the backdrop of the much-trumpeted U.S.-China economic decoupling. More and more consumers around the world start to enjoy multiple choices and convenience brought about by cross-border e-commerce.

A customs survey of enterprises shows that more than 70% of enterprises expect  stable or growing imports and exports of cross-border e-commerce in 2023. The GACC will implement the fundamental state policy of opening up to the outside world and the open strategy with a focus on mutual benefit and win-win to strengthen the construction of smart customs, enhance trade convenience, promote the cross-border flow of factors of production, embrace the digital era, share the opportunities of e-commerce development with other countries in the world, and build an open world economy together.

The development of China's e-commerce is in line with the principle of promoting the optimization and upgrading of trade in goods and innovating the development mechanism of trade in services put forward in the report of the 20th Party Congress. The General Office of the State Council also issued a document to promote healthy and sustainable innovation and the development of cross-border e-commerce, support foreign trade enterprises through cross-border e-commerce, and other new business models to expand sales channels and cultivate China's self-developed brands.

China's cross-border e-commerce industry has maintained a growth rate of almost 20% or more since 2016, with the scale of China's cross-border e-commerce transactions reaching 12.5 trillion yuan in 2020. 2022 annual cross-border e-commerce import and export volume (including B2B) was 2.11 trillion yuan, an increase of 9.8% year-on-year. Among them, exports reached 1.55 trillion yuan, an increase of 11.7% year-on-year.

As China's cross-border e-commerce imports and exports reach new highs, China's trade partners have become more diversified. China's cross-border e-commerce trade is dominated by exports and this trend has become prominent recently. In terms of import and export structure, China's cross-border e-commerce has been dominated by exports in recent years, with total exports accounting for nearly 70% of total cross-border e-commerce imports and exports in 2021 and imports accounting for only about 27%.