Recently, the Ministry of Commerce, together with six other departments including the Office of the Central Cyberspace Affairs Commission, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, the State Administration for Market Regulation, and the State Post Bureau, issued the Notice on Implementing the Quality E-Commerce "Five Excellence" Initiative. The head of the E-Commerce Department of the Ministry of Commerce provided an interpretation of the Notice.

Background of the Notice

In recent years, China's e-commerce market has consistently ranked first globally in scale, playing a positive role in boosting consumption, serving the real economy, driving innovation, and expanding opening-up. It now possesses the foundational scale and space needed to promote quality upgrading in e-commerce. The General Office of the Central Committee and the General Office of the State Council issued the Special Action Plan for Boosting Consumption, which calls for vigorously developing quality e-commerce. Launching the Quality E-Commerce "Five Excellence" Initiative and coordinating efforts from all parties to drive the e-commerce industry's transition from scale expansion to quality improvement is both an intrinsic requirement for promoting consumption upgrading and expansion and meeting the people's demand for quality and personalized consumption, and a concrete measure to strengthen positive guidance, reshape a healthy competitive landscape, and promote win-win development among e-commerce platforms, their operators, and workers.

Main Content of the Notice

The Notice clarifies the principles of combining livelihood improvement with consumption promotion, placing equal emphasis on regulated development and quality enhancement, and integrating digital technology with the real economy. It deploys 15 specific tasks as key priorities, building a full-chain cultivation system around five major dimensions.

First, organizing e-commerce platforms for "Quality Advancement," strengthening the cultivation of quality e-commerce entities, promoting the transformation of platform rules toward excellence, and establishing a full-chain quality control system. Second, supporting various merchants for "Quality Innovation," enhancing merchants' quality operation capabilities, innovatively developing e-commerce consumer brands, and empowering quality merchants in market expansion. Third, facilitating consumers in "Quality Selection," building a matrix of quality consumption activities, creating integrated online and offline quality consumption scenarios, and strengthening consumption guidance and financial services. Fourth, guiding Silk Road e-commerce for "Quality Excellence," building a sound ecosystem for e-commerce going global, cultivating and promoting "Silk Road Cloud Products" brands, and advancing high-level opening-up in the e-commerce sector. Fifth, strengthening norms and standards for "Long-term Quality Protection," improving the e-commerce standards system, collaboratively addressing disorderly and irrational competition, and strengthening industry self-discipline.

In the next step, the Ministry of Commerce will work with relevant departments to ensure the implementation of the "Five Excellence" Initiative measures takes effect, using quality e-commerce development to help upgrade consumption quality and achieve high-quality development of e-commerce.