Agriculture and food sectors to benefit from online platform

China has launched an online trade information platform on agricultural and food products to further enhance trade with countries along the Belt and Road Initiative.

The Agricultural Products and Food Information Exchange Platform is aimed to further promote trade in the agricultural and food sectors among the countries along the route, said Xie Yuan, vice-president of the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, one of the initiators of the platform, in Beijing on Tuesday.

Other initiators include the Asian Peace and Reconciliation Council, a non-governmental organization launched by distinguished former national leaders and ministers, and the China Public Diplomacy Association.

Qu Dongyu, vice-minister of agriculture, said the platform will also push forward the development of a common agricultural and food market for countries along the road

“The platform will establish a platform for communication and trade to help domestic food and agricultural firms to go global. It will also help introduce more foreign enterprises in those sectors to China,” he said.

The platform will incorporate trade information on agricultural and food products in countries along the route, and enable the international trade of such products, he said.

The platform will also establish a mechanism on the supply and demand information of products, and a mechanism on supervision.

Countries along the Belt and Road Initiative make full use of the platform to speed up their agricultural development, he said.

The platform will include functions including enterprise entry, product launching and agricultural and food information sharing. It will also include functions of online trade of products and product tracing, and the launch of an application for smartphone devices by March next year.

The online platform will also be available in Russian and English as well as Chinese.