Foreign merchants browse goods in Yiwu, Zhejiang province, in November. HU XIAOFEI/FOR CHINA DAILY

From a "sell global" to a "buy global" mindset, Yiwu, Zhejiang province, is set to launch a new round of international trade reforms, officials and entrepreneurs said.

As a globally renowned hub for small commodities — known as the "world's supermarket" and a key supplier for Chinese cross-border e-commerce platforms — Yiwu maintains trade relationships with 233 countries and regions, attracting nearly 600,000 foreign visitors annually, 15,000 of whom are long-term residents of the city.

As early as 2011, Yiwu was tasked with an overall plan for comprehensive international trade reforms. This round of reforms primarily focused on promoting exports and addressing the challenge of "sell global".

After over a decade of reform practices, Yiwu has established a market procurement trade model, which has been replicated in 39 markets across 22 provincial-level regions nationwide. The Yiwu-Xinjiang-Europe freight train and the "Yiwu-Ningbo-Zhoushan" Grand Open Channel connect over 1,000 overseas cities, driving the development of 2.1 million small and micro enterprises and providing jobs for 32 million.

Benefiting from these reforms, Yiwu has grown from a county-level city into a type-II large city with a permanent population of nearly 2 million. Its export scale has increased from one-thousandth of the national total to one-fiftieth, and its express delivery volume has grown nearly 30 fold in the past decade, accounting for one-twelfth of the national total.

The State Council has approved an overall plan for deepening comprehensive international trade reforms in the city, according to a circular released on Dec 11.

At a news conference on Dec 24, Li Jun, deputy director of the Zhejiang Provincial Development and Reform Commission, said the plan outlines a vision to promote reforms in Yiwu through further opening-up, along with initiatives such as innovating market procurement trade mechanisms, promoting import trade development, enhancing the functionality of comprehensive bonded zones and strengthening cross-border e-commerce regulations.

"The new round of reforms is positioned as 'deepening comprehensive reform of international trade in Yiwu', with the keyword being 'deepening'," Li said. "This indicates that the new round of reforms builds on the foundation of the previous reforms rather than starting from scratch. Regardless of the phase, the core theme has always been small commodity trade, focusing on serving small and medium-sized business entities."

Li added: "The previous reforms emphasized export trade, addressing the issue of 'sell global'. Yiwu's exports grew from approximately 20 billion yuan ($2.73 billion) in 2010 to over 500 billion yuan in 2023, an increase of more than 24 fold, contributing significantly to stabilizing foreign trade. However, the import-to-export ratio in Yiwu remains about 1:10, necessitating further reforms in the import sector. This new round of reforms will prioritize imports, focusing on 'buy global' while iterating and deepening 'sell global,' ultimately achieving 'buy global and sell global'."

Promoting Belt and Road cooperation and high-quality development of the China-Europe freight train network, the small commodity hub is slated to further contribute to advancing China's dual circulation strategy, which integrates domestic and global markets and supports efforts to build China into an even stronger trading nation, the circular noted.

The plan explicitly states that cross-border e-commerce rules should better reflect the interests of small businesses and platforms, accelerating alignment with international standards such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership in areas like data flow, product traceability, electronic signatures, dispute resolution, intellectual property protections and consumer rights safeguards.

"Yiwu receives a large number of foreign traders every year. From January to November 2024,514,600 foreign traders entered Yiwu, a 55 percent increase compared to the previous year, with a projected total of 570,000 for 2024, marking a new high. To provide convenience for foreign traders in terms of entry, residence, healthcare and payments, we have integrated reforms across multiple departments, including public security, technology, human resources and commerce. This systematic planning aims to facilitate foreign investment and business operations in China," Li said.