Coastal areas lead regional e-commerce retail

BEIJING - China's coastal areas lead the Greater China region in cross-border e-commerce retail, ranking highest in both transaction volume and growth rate, according to a report by global online retail giant eBay on Wednesday.

From June 2012 to June 2013, the southern coastal province of Guangdong overtook Hong Kong to rank first in the Greater China region in cross-border e-commerce retail sales volume, with east China's Shanghai Municipality ranking third, data from the eBay report showed.

During the same period, exporters in the coastal provinces of Fujian, Zhejiang and Jiangsu recorded the fastest year-on-year growth in cross-border e-commerce sales via eBay platforms, with total sales surging 76.1 percent, 56.1 percent and 52.0 percent, respectively.

E-commerce business in central China's Hubei, Hebei and Henan provinces has also been growing quickly, the report said.

For e-commerce retailers across the Greater China region, business targeting emerging markets, including Argentina, Israel and Brazil, has witnessed substantial growth, the report also noted.

More than 52 percent of sellers surveyed said they were optimistic about business prospects in the next 12 months, it added.0   China's Ministry of Commerce said last week that China will further boost its e-commerce business, providing policy and financial support for manufacturers and foreign enterprises conducting cross-border e-commerce.

The country will try to bring online retail sales up to 10 percent of total consumer goods retail sales by 2015.

A July report by PayPal, a payment platform under eBay, predicted that cross-border online retail demand in five major markets, including the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Australia and Brazil, would reach 70 billion U.S. dollars in 2013 and demand would double by 2018.