Business leaders meeting in China propose global e-commerce platform to benefit smaller firms

The business outreach arm of the G20 summit has proposed to world leaders an initiative to create a global e-commerce platform to knock down barriers in online trade amid growing anti-globalisation fervour.

The so-called B20 group, comprising business leaders from G20 countries, raised the idea of an electronic world trade platform, or eWTP, as a policy recommendation to be considered during the two-day summit which opened in Hangzhou on Sunday.

“E-commerce is an emerging area of global trade but we don’t have a clear framework [on regulations for electronic trade],” said Thomas Bernes, a distinguished fellow with the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI), an independent think tank in Canada. “The trade ministers of G20 will need to take it up when the eWTP is included in the list policy recommendations by B20.”

The eWTP, a concept first raised by Jack Ma, founder of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group, in March at the Boao Forum, aims to reduce barriers for small and medium-sized (SMEs) enterprises in cross-border e-commerce. Alibaba is the owner of the South China Morning Post.

With the rising tide of protectionism, the biggest barriersare seen as the wide variety of market specific regulations with which products must comply, burdensome customs procedures, and access to logistics and financing. On top of that, a number of governments are contemplating raising taxes and tariffs on small package shipments.

If the idea takes off, smaller merchants under the eWTP, which would be an open platform, will be able to sell their products to global consumers with fewer logistics procedures and reduced red tape, thus lowering costs.