The Conference on County Commercial Innovation and Development in Digital Economic Era kicked off in Hangzhou City, Zhejiang Province, on November 25, 2023. It announced the list of the first batch of 123 leading counties and county-level cities in commercial strength and typical cases.

Seven Hunan counties and county-level cities made the list, including Changsha County, Hengyang County, Xiangtan County, Shaodong City, Yueyang County, Lixian County, and Xupu County. The shortlisted typical cases included:

- Changsha County has strengthened policy support to guide the flourishing development of commerce and trade;

- Hengyang County has empowered the construction of county commercial system to promote rural revitalization; and,

- Xiangtan County has utilized livestreaming approach to boost rural revitalization via "local Xiangtan goods" e-commerce platform.

The Ministry of Commerce and eight other departments jointly publicized a three-year action plan (2023‑2025) this August, aiming to strengthen the nation's county-level commerce system further, in an effort to promote the integrated development of urban and rural areas and rejuvenate the nation's rural regions. The plan included the creation of 500 "frontrunner" counties by 2025, which will have county-level logistics distribution centers, rural commerce centers such as large and medium-sized supermarkets and farm produce markets, and convenience stores for rural populations. It sought to summarize and promote a number of typical cases, strengthen the replication and promotion of experiences, and advance the high-quality development of county-level commerce.

Hunan has obtained nearly 500 million yuan of support funds from the central government in building county-level commerce system since 2022, according to the Department of Commerce of Hunan Province, driving a total social investment of about 9 billion yuan. So far, there have been 97 newly-established or upgraded county-level comprehensive trade service centers, 194 trade centers in towns and townships, 8,015 convenience stores at village-level, 89 county logistics and distribution centers, and 269 farm produce markets across Hunan, uplifting the county-level commerce system to a new level.

This article is from the Hunan Provincial Government www.enghunan.gov.cn.

Translator: Yu Jiangjiang

Chinese source: hunan.gov.cn