How can traditional agricultural areas innovate and develop rural e-commerce?
In recent years, China's e-commerce has developed rapidly, not only creating new consumer demand, triggering a new investment boom, opening up new channels for employment and income growth, and providing new space for mass entrepreneurship and innovation, but e-commerce is also accelerating its integration with manufacturing, driving the transformation and upgrading of the service industry, spawning emerging business forms, and becoming a new driving force for economic development. It is worth noting that how can traditional agricultural areas innovate and develop e-commerce? The e-commerce models of different agricultural areas are not the same. What methods to adopt and what paths to choose relate to whether rural e-commerce can achieve healthy and sustainable development. Can traditional agricultural areas rely on agriculture to obtain high returns? What role should the government play in this? The exploration and practice of Suyu District in Suqian City, Jiangsu; Suichang County in Lishui City, Zhejiang; and Dongchangfu District in Liaocheng City, Shandong are worth attention. ——The Editor
Suichang's “Ganjie Network” launches urban-rural express
Recently, a group of young people in Luzhou City, Sichuan Province, used online stores to sell local agricultural products in the e-commerce department of the Luzhou Southwest Commerce and Trade City. Since last year, the city has actively built e-commerce platforms, providing various preferential policies such as startup funds and in-kind support, and continuously attracting a group of young people who understand computers and are good at sales to join.
⟦NL> Two years ago, Taobao and the Alibaba Research Center released a research report titled “Suichang Model” in Suichang, Zhejiang. At the same time, experts also discovered for the first time a rural e-commerce service station called “Ganjie,” which can provide villagers with online shopping services and also help sell agricultural products externally.
When the ancient and traditional farming civilization meets passionate e-commerce, Suichang, Zhejiang, a small mountainous county town in southwestern Zhejiang, became “an instant hit.”
Online goods enter villages, local goods enter cities
In 2013, Zhejiang Ganjie E-Commerce Co., Ltd. was established in Suichang. “Ganjie” means “going to market” in the local dialect. Consumers in Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shanghai only need to place an order through Ganjie Network and can receive fresh Suichang local products the next day. Even fresh agricultural products such as free-range chickens, free-range eggs and free-range pork can be delivered safely and freshly to the door within the next day.
“The ‘Ganjie’ project developed by Suichang County is about helping farmers sell agricultural products online and then helping them buy the consumer goods they need, aiming to help villagers solve supply and marketing difficulties.” A person in charge of “Ganjie” told reporters, “Ganjie” has annual transaction volume reaching 480 million yuan, and many agricultural products are still in short supply. For example, Suichang's local famous roasted sweet potatoes can sell more than 10,000 jin a day and often run out of stock every few days.
“We help rural residents buy daily necessities on Taobao, and can also provide online goods and services to rural areas such as mobile phone credit top-ups, utility bill payments, train ticket and hotel bookings, and medical appointment reservations.” said Pan Dongming, head of the Suichang County Online Store Association. Through the “Ganjie” project, villagers can also post supply and demand information for agricultural products, making it convenient for farmers to find buyers and trying to avoid blind planting and unsold agricultural products.
Two years ago, Suichang County built its first “Ganjie” outlet in Wuchu Village, Wangcunkou Town, 75 kilometers from the county seat. In the following months, the “Ganjie” project gradually spread across villages in Suichang. Up to now, Suichang County has 210 “Ganjie” service stations, achieving full coverage of administrative villages across the county, providing nearly 10,000 services each month. Some village service stations have monthly purchasing amounts as high as 90,000 yuan, and the whole county saves villagers hundreds of thousands of yuan each month.
Open up the “last kilometer” to let express delivery enter villages
Reporters saw on site that most outlets are equipped with LCD TVs, and the other end of the TV is connected to a computer, simultaneously broadcasting records of recent purchases made on Taobao on behalf of villagers, ranging from farm tools such as farming machines and water pumps to daily necessities such as razors, clothes hangers and tissues.
Liu Zhijun, head of the “Ganjie” project, said that building the “Ganjie” project is about extending online shopping services to rural areas, allowing rural people in areas with inconvenient transportation, relatively backward information and an incomplete supporting service system to enjoy one-stop services such as shopping, selling goods, paying bills, starting businesses, traveling, entertainment and obtaining information.
However, compared with online shopping entering county towns, entering villages is obviously much more difficult. The first link to open up is logistics. Most rural areas in Suichang have no express delivery. Apart from the seats of the two town governments, Shilian and Dazhe, where STO Express can be sent, other villages in the county only have postal EMS, and it is delivered only once a week.
To solve this problem, relevant departments in Suichang and the online store association jointly built a logistics system from Suichang county town to various villages, at 4 yuan per order, arriving in one day. Every day, the first thing outlet staff do when they start work is register the express deliveries delivered to the outlet, and then notify villagers to come and collect them. Similarly, if villagers have items to send, they only need to hand them over to the village “Ganjie” outlet.
“Now, villagers can enjoy convenience without leaving the village.” Liu Zhijun said that the key point of “Ganjie” also lies in quality control, using departments such as industry and commerce and quality supervision to strictly control product quality and prevent villagers from buying fake goods.