China’s poverty alleviation recipe: E-commerce

In 2014, China launched demonstration projects to introduce e-commerce to rural areas. By the end of 2020, all 832 poor counties have been included in the initiative, with an investment of RMB 24.92 billion. E-commerce has helped more and more farmers in China to get into the mass market. The number of e-businesses in the poor counties grew from 1.32 million in 2016 to 3.11 million in 2020. Online retail sales in rural areas reached 1.79 trillion yuan (about 277 billion U.S. dollars) in 2020, a year-on-year increase of 8.9%.

Adoption and promotion of e-commerce in poor areas in China have shown how digital technologies can be used in poverty reduction efforts, and China’s experience is a strong example of global poverty reduction.