China's online retail market reaches new high in 2020
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The development of China's online retail market continued to improve and the market hit a new high last year, according to the Ministry of Commerce.

File photo: Agencies

National online retail sales in 2020 had a year-on-year growth of 10.9 percent, totaling 11.76 trillion yuan ($1.81 trillion), while the online retail sales of physical goods reached 9.76 trillion yuan, an increase of 14.8% year-on-year, contributing nearly a quarter to the total retail sales of consumer goods, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.

Last year's online retail market in China featured several characteristics.

The first was that the drivers of development changed and the consumption upgrade still gained momentum. Facing complex and severe challenges, national online retail has showcased sufficient resilience, proactively turning crises into opportunities.

New business forms and models were developing rapidly. In 2020, the key e-commerce platforms had conducted more than 24 million live broadcasts, online education sales increased by more than 140% year-on-year, and the number of online medical consultations increased by 73.4% year-on-year.

Large-scale online shopping spree events such as "Double 11" have strongly stimulated market growth, while the accelerated integration of online and offline consumption allowed e-commerce companies to facilitate the transformation and upgrading of offline entities.

The second was that cross-border e-commerce continued to promote the development of foreign trade. According to Customs statistics, import and export volume of cross-border e-commerce in the country reached 1.69 trillion yuan in 2020, up 31.1 percent.

Another trait was that rural e-commerce saw a qualitative upgrade. National rural online retail sales experienced a year-on-year increase of 8.9% to 1.79 trillion yuan in 2020. E-commerce accelerated agricultural industrialization and digital development, and strongly promoted rural revitalization and poverty alleviation.

(Compiled by Liao Yuecen, edited by Xu Zheqi)