MIIT Issues Development Guidelines for Chinese E-Commerce

Well, it looks like the folks over at China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology really drank their coffee this morning! Earlier today we learned about their anti-spam-text campaign, and this morning, the Ministry also issued a new set of guidelines meant to shape the development of Chinese e-commerce. The full report is quite long, but of course, what you’re really interested in are the policy initiatives, of which there are ten:

1. Strengthen organizational guarantees: Local governments should take further steps to organize with e-commerce, increase oversight in this area, and adopt e-commerce companies into existing channels of supervision and cooperation.
2. Create a robust environment for the development of trust in e-commerce: Everyone — government, consumers, and the companies themselves — should push to hold e-commerce sites accountable for their promises.
3. Increase public service and market oversight in e-commerce: Again, local governments should get more involved in supervising e-commerce sites, especially in ensuring they abide by the laws.
4. Increase the strength of attacks against illegal behavior in e-commerce: More recommendation of strong government oversight, including the possible founding of a long-term branch of government dedicated to oversight and law enforcement in this area.
5. Perfect mechanisms protecting rights and benefits [of consumers]: Extend existing and create new systems to ensure the rights of consumers are protected in the e-commerce sphere.
6. Strengthen e-commerce legislation and create industry standards and norms: Pretty self-explanatory.
7. Perfect the diversification of e-commerce financing mechanisms: Increase transparency in financing and also increase government investment in this area.
8. Strengthen statistical monitoring of e-commerce: Increase cooperation and oversight of the relevant government departments to ensure accurate statistical tracking of the market.
9. Speed the development of skilled professionals: Increase training initiatives, etc.
10. Increase international cooperation: Work with more international companies, and promote the development of Chinese companies through cooperation.

Those are just very short summaries, of course, there’s much more in the full report. The overall message is pretty clear, though; Chinese terms for “oversight/monitoring” appear at least 17 times in the report, and the term “guide” — as in, the government will guide e-commerce companies as they develop — appears 12 times. In other words, I hope you like some relevant departments in your online shopping, because you’re about to get ‘em.