E-commerce joins campaign to combat poverty
By Ai Yang
Original, chinagate.cn, 02-25-2016
Poverty alleviation concerns not only the government and enterprises, as it’s a social responsibility and every one of us should play a part in it. The government should consider how to encourage the public force to become more involved in poverty alleviation.
The just concluded Central Economic Work Conference raised the poverty alleviation issue. It promised more efforts such as funds and policies to improve the quality of poverty alleviation work. The 13th five-year-plan is the key phase for China to reach the goal of building a well-off society in an all-round way. Poverty alleviation will be a very important political task in China in the next five years. In early 2015, the State Council Poverty Alleviation Office has listed e-commerce as one of the ten projects to achieve targeted measures in poverty alleviation. On December 31, 2015, Tang Min, counselor of State Council and deputy chairman of YouChange China Social Entrepreneur Foundation told reporters that China’s Internet Plus strategy has helped find a new way to combat poverty using e-commerce as a platform, which will help underdeveloped regions in China catch up with their neighboring regions. However, Tang said the development of the new platform still needs social support, and other means such as education and technology should also be used. Tang said it’s the responsibility of everyone to take part in the poverty alleviation campaign.
Rural e-commerce a new way to combat poverty
According to the National Bureau of Statistics, currently there’re still 70.17 million rural residents living below the poverty line, accounting for 7.2 percent of rural population. In recent years, China’s e-commerce has expanded rapidly, and information technology and e-commerce have created a new opportunity for poverty alleviation work. E-commerce poverty alleviation aims to use its online platform to boost entrepreneurship and consumption, and promote local specialties in those underdeveloped regions. According to officials from the Ministry of Commerce, currently the e-commerce industry’s development in underdeveloped regions has been considerable. Seventy-five percent of the 100 counties that have seen the most increase in mobile online shopping are in the Midwest. Of the counties that have achieved sales of over 100 million yuan, twenty-one are below the national poverty line.
Tang believes the rapid development of e-commerce will bring many benefits. Farmers can increase their income by getting rid of the middleman. Urban consumers can have more choices when buying online, which may help ease their food safety concern and make their purchase more personalized. However, Tang also said to realize these benefits there has to be a way to maintain smooth cooperation among the government, farmers, online retailers, logistics and customers.
Tang said farmers didn’t benefit very much from the pricing despite urban consumers paying a relatively high price for the agricultural products due to middlemen. Online retailers selling agricultural products from underdeveloped regions face both advantages and disadvantages. Their strength is the products are environmental friendly and have regional characteristics, and the government’s targeted poverty alleviation measures will support their businesses.
In August 2015, the Ministry of Commerce and 18 other government departments jointly issued the Suggestions on Accelerating the Development of Rural E-Commerce. The document put forward that with expanding popularity of the Internet and improvement of rural infrastructure, China's rural e-commerce has seen rapid development, constant innovation, and enriched service content. E-commerce’s size continues to expand, however, the business on the whole is still at the beginning stage, and there exist many issues such as an immature market, backward logistics infrastructure, talent shortage and so on. Tang said other than logistics problems, products from underdeveloped regions must be packaged better in order to meet the higher demand of urban consumers, while the government, enterprises and social organizations should also help solve the talent shortage issue, as there aren’t as many people that are familiar with e-commerce and online retail in those regions.
Poverty alleviation is a social responsibility
Tang said there needs to be special policies and measures to help underdeveloped regions solve e-commerce development issues. For example, the government can set up village e-commerce service stations and train one or several people per station. He said in the meantime, local governments also need to help villages build logistics systems, as commercial enterprises relying on the market mechanism alone will not give priority to setting up logistics in underdeveloped regions. City promotions should also be employed, and urban residents should be encouraged to purchase more from rural retailers online. Tang said poverty alleviation relies not only on the government and enterprises, but also on the social force.
To let the social force play a role in poverty alleviation, Tang said the market should be allowed to do what it can, and the government shall only play a role in sectors where enterprises are not willing to get involved, such as skills training, internet infrastructure building, remote areas logistics subsidy, and encouraging urban residents to make online purchases from retailers from underdeveloped regions. He said the government should do only what the market can’t.
The YouChange China Social Entrepreneur Foundation has always been actively involved in the poverty alleviation campaign. The e-commerce capability building project by the Foundation helps poor rural residents start their e-commerce businesses, providing online and offline training. The Foundation teaches e-commerce basics and gives operation instructions live online to help rural residents increase their income generating ability, and promote local development.
YouChange has launched pilot e-commerce training programs in 100 villages across the provinces of Gansu, Guizhou, Jiangxi and Hebei. Other than face-to-face training, Tang said YouChange also plans to use case studies to help poor farmers learn e-commerce knowledge. For example, if farmers want to sell carrots online, the village station will help them find other farmers who have successfully done so through the Foundation’s website, and by watching previous examples, farmers will learn how to make online promotions, manage purchases, and receive payments. The e-commerce station archives several hundred documentaries on the internet sales of agricultural products. “The training is different than other forms of training as it teaches farmers step by step. This kind of large-scale long term training model can only be achieved on the internet,” said Tang.
Walmart Foundation has already signed an agreement with Youchange to promote the training model to 10,000 villages.
Poverty alleviation needs multiple approaches
According to the latest survey by the State Council Poverty Alleviation Office, of the current 70 million poor rural population, 42 percent of the poverty are caused by diseases, 20 percent by disasters, 10 percent by lack of schooling, 8 percent by weak work ability and 20 percent by other causes. Most of those farmers have no additional means to generate income. Tang said backward infrastructures, poor and even unsuitable living environments for humans are some of the reasons causing poverty in those regions, while the only way for them is to relocate, the government must assume the leading role to solve the issue. E-commerce can only help those individuals and families that have work ability, and there has to be other means to help combat poverty where e-commerce can’t reach.
Poverty alleviation needs multiple approaches, whereas e-commerce building is one of them. Tang said e-commerce solves the sales channel issue, whereas technology support solves the production issue. He said e-commerce would be a great help to farmers once the right sales channels are established.
Many online retailers have realized this issue and on September 25, 2015, the State Council Poverty Alleviation Office signed a strategic cooperation agreement with Suning Cloud. In March 2015, JD.com introduced the 3F strategy (Factory to Country, Finance to Country, and Farm to Table) and introduced rural credit products in September. JD’s rival Alibaba has begun investing in the rural market even earlier. Its online platform Taobao has already launched services in rural areas.
By Ai Yang
Original, chinagate.cn, 02-25-2016
Poverty alleviation concerns not only the government and enterprises, as it’s a social responsibility and every one of us should play a part in it. The government should consider how to encourage the public force to become more involved in poverty alleviation.
The just concluded Central Economic Work Conference raised the poverty alleviation issue. It promised more efforts such as funds and policies to improve the quality of poverty alleviation work. The 13th five-year-plan is the key phase for China to reach the goal of building a well-off society in an all-round way. Poverty alleviation will be a very important political task in China in the next five years. In early 2015, the State Council Poverty Alleviation Office has listed e-commerce as one of the ten projects to achieve targeted measures in poverty alleviation. On December 31, 2015, Tang Min, counselor of State Council and deputy chairman of YouChange China Social Entrepreneur Foundation told reporters that China’s Internet Plus strategy has helped find a new way to combat poverty using e-commerce as a platform, which will help underdeveloped regions in China catch up with their neighboring regions. However, Tang said the development of the new platform still needs social support, and other means such as education and technology should also be used. Tang said it’s the responsibility of everyone to take part in the poverty alleviation campaign.
Rural e-commerce a new way to combat poverty
According to the National Bureau of Statistics, currently there’re still 70.17 million rural residents living below the poverty line, accounting for 7.2 percent of rural population. In recent years, China’s e-commerce has expanded rapidly, and information technology and e-commerce have created a new opportunity for poverty alleviation work. E-commerce poverty alleviation aims to use its online platform to boost entrepreneurship and consumption, and promote local specialties in those underdeveloped regions. According to officials from the Ministry of Commerce, currently the e-commerce industry’s development in underdeveloped regions has been considerable. Seventy-five percent of the 100 counties that have seen the most increase in mobile online shopping are in the Midwest. Of the counties that have achieved sales of over 100 million yuan, twenty-one are below the national poverty line.
Tang believes the rapid development of e-commerce will bring many benefits. Farmers can increase their income by getting rid of the middleman. Urban consumers can have more choices when buying online, which may help ease their food safety concern and make their purchase more personalized. However, Tang also said to realize these benefits there has to be a way to maintain smooth cooperation among the government, farmers, online retailers, logistics and customers.
Tang said farmers didn’t benefit very much from the pricing despite urban consumers paying a relatively high price for the agricultural products due to middlemen. Online retailers selling agricultural products from underdeveloped regions face both advantages and disadvantages. Their strength is the products are environmental friendly and have regional characteristics, and the government’s targeted poverty alleviation measures will support their businesses.
In August 2015, the Ministry of Commerce and 18 other government departments jointly issued the Suggestions on Accelerating the Development of Rural E-Commerce. The document put forward that with expanding popularity of the Internet and improvement of rural infrastructure, China's rural e-commerce has seen rapid development, constant innovation, and enriched service content. E-commerce’s size continues to expand, however, the business on the whole is still at the beginning stage, and there exist many issues such as an immature market, backward logistics infrastructure, talent shortage and so on. Tang said other than logistics problems, products from underdeveloped regions must be packaged better in order to meet the higher demand of urban consumers, while the government, enterprises and social organizations should also help solve the talent shortage issue, as there aren’t as many people that are familiar with e-commerce and online retail in those regions.
Poverty alleviation is a social responsibility
Tang said there needs to be special policies and measures to help underdeveloped regions solve e-commerce development issues. For example, the government can set up village e-commerce service stations and train one or several people per station. He said in the meantime, local governments also need to help villages build logistics systems, as commercial enterprises relying on the market mechanism alone will not give priority to setting up logistics in underdeveloped regions. City promotions should also be employed, and urban residents should be encouraged to purchase more from rural retailers online. Tang said poverty alleviation relies not only on the government and enterprises, but also on the social force.
To let the social force play a role in poverty alleviation, Tang said the market should be allowed to do what it can, and the government shall only play a role in sectors where enterprises are not willing to get involved, such as skills training, internet infrastructure building, remote areas logistics subsidy, and encouraging urban residents to make online purchases from retailers from underdeveloped regions. He said the government should do only what the market can’t.
The YouChange China Social Entrepreneur Foundation has always been actively involved in the poverty alleviation campaign. The e-commerce capability building project by the Foundation helps poor rural residents start their e-commerce businesses, providing online and offline training. The Foundation teaches e-commerce basics and gives operation instructions live online to help rural residents increase their income generating ability, and promote local development.
YouChange has launched pilot e-commerce training programs in 100 villages across the provinces of Gansu, Guizhou, Jiangxi and Hebei. Other than face-to-face training, Tang said YouChange also plans to use case studies to help poor farmers learn e-commerce knowledge. For example, if farmers want to sell carrots online, the village station will help them find other farmers who have successfully done so through the Foundation’s website, and by watching previous examples, farmers will learn how to make online promotions, manage purchases, and receive payments. The e-commerce station archives several hundred documentaries on the internet sales of agricultural products. “The training is different than other forms of training as it teaches farmers step by step. This kind of large-scale long term training model can only be achieved on the internet,” said Tang.
Walmart Foundation has already signed an agreement with Youchange to promote the training model to 10,000 villages.
Poverty alleviation needs multiple approaches
According to the latest survey by the State Council Poverty Alleviation Office, of the current 70 million poor rural population, 42 percent of the poverty are caused by diseases, 20 percent by disasters, 10 percent by lack of schooling, 8 percent by weak work ability and 20 percent by other causes. Most of those farmers have no additional means to generate income. Tang said backward infrastructures, poor and even unsuitable living environments for humans are some of the reasons causing poverty in those regions, while the only way for them is to relocate, the government must assume the leading role to solve the issue. E-commerce can only help those individuals and families that have work ability, and there has to be other means to help combat poverty where e-commerce can’t reach.
Poverty alleviation needs multiple approaches, whereas e-commerce building is one of them. Tang said e-commerce solves the sales channel issue, whereas technology support solves the production issue. He said e-commerce would be a great help to farmers once the right sales channels are established.
Many online retailers have realized this issue and on September 25, 2015, the State Council Poverty Alleviation Office signed a strategic cooperation agreement with Suning Cloud. In March 2015, JD.com introduced the 3F strategy (Factory to Country, Finance to Country, and Farm to Table) and introduced rural credit products in September. JD’s rival Alibaba has begun investing in the rural market even earlier. Its online platform Taobao has already launched services in rural areas.
