China, Russia enjoy booming e-commerce cooperation

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Cross-border e-commerce trade between China and Russia is booming and has become a new growth point for bilateral economic and trade relations.

The two countries signed the memorandum of understanding (MoU) on e-commerce cooperation in last June to establish a bilateral e-commerce cooperation mechanism, which echoed the new trends of China-Russia economic and trade cooperation.

China's Commerce Ministry data showed that China-Russia cross-border e-commerce hit 3.7 billion U.S. dollars from January to September last year, up 23 percent year on year. Andrey Denisov, Russian ambassador to China, said the number would surpass four billion U.S. dollars at the end of 2018, according to Sputnik News.

CGTN Infographic

Silk Road e-commerce, which was introduced alongside the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), stands as a new opportunity for China-Russia e-commerce trade as Russia is paying more attention to its e-commerce market.

Russia's e-commerce market has witnessed stable growth in recent years due to an increasing number of Russian consumers who are willing to buy products from overseas websites.

Morgan Stanley predicts that the e-commerce market in Russia will value 50 billion U.S. dollars in 2020, which signals huge potential for bilateral e-commerce cooperation.

China-Russia e-commerce business opportunity

China accounts for about 90 percent of the total cross-border shipments to Russia, and about half of Russia's cross-border e-commerce turnover.

In May 2015, Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba established its first headquarters in Russia, aiming to improve its services and cooperation with the Russian government. On June 18, JD.com officially launched its Russian site, opening up the Russian market.

China accounts for about 90 percent of the total cross-border shipments to Russia. /VCG Photo

Online Russian retailer Yandex.Market inked a strategic partnership deal with JD.com on May 31 this year, according to the Moscow Times.

China's e-commerce influence in Russia

Online Chinese shops are popular in Russia, as Yandex found that the most frequently searched words alongside "China" is "shop", "product" and "delivery". Research group GFK showed that the number of visits by Russian consumers on Chinese online shops increased from 25 percent in 2013 to 39 percent in 2014.

CGTN Infographic

Major China-Russia cross-border e-commerce platforms include Aliexpress, TradeEase, DHgate, Ulmart and Wildberries.

Alibaba's cross border e-commerce platform Aliexpress is the most visited of these sites, according to a report by the Ecommerce Foundation. In 2017 alone, the site had 22.194 billion unique hits.

Today, it currently over four million active Russian users with two million U.S. dollars' worth of products delivered to Russia per day, and this number grows on holidays, said the report.