Service platform launched to support China's import expo

Shanghai has set up a one-stop trading service platform to support its hosting of the China International Import Expo in November.

The city yesterday launched the one-stop year-round exhibition and transaction platform, and announced the establishment of Shanghai International Import Trading Services Co.

This move puts the action plan of the last 200 days’ preparation for the expo into practice. It is also a measure to help to magnify both the driving and the spillover effect of the import expo.

The city’s commission of commerce built the platform in line with the expo’s implementation plan approved by the central leadership.

Furthermore, the launch of the one-stop platform marks the basic formation of a normal professional service mode for the expo, which has three functions — exhibiting, promoting transactions, and offering professional import services.

The platform will demonstrate not only the exhibits of the six-day expo, which opens on November 5, but import exhibits from all the year-round exhibition platforms.

The first batch of year-round platforms, totaling 30, was launched on April 11.

Leading firms in logistics, exhibition, e-commerce, finance and consulting sectors have been gathered on the platform to offer professional services to participants of the expo.

Shanghai International Import Trading Services is a joint venture co-funded by the Council for the Promotion of International Trade Shanghai and the Donghao Lansheng Group, a major state-owned enterprise in the modern service industry.

The service company is set up mainly to take charge of the design, construction and operation of the one-stop service platform.

The platform will use smart methods to provide professional services, including online demonstration, matchmaking, transactions and payment.

Information sharing will be enhanced to promote the matching of supply and demand, supporting global products, services and technologies to enter the Chinese market.

“The platform will exhibit the world’s latest products, most advanced technology and featured products, make matches for exhibitors and purchasers, enhance their communication, and promote the transaction,” said Wang Qiang, chairman of Donghao Lansheng. 

Yang Jianrong, chairman of the Council for the Promotion of International Trade Shanghai, said the service platform is there to promote global trade and gather the world’s top brands, products and services to enable companies from all countries to sell their products throughout the world via the platform.

It will strongly push forward the process of trade globalization, Yang added.

Shanghai’s Party Secretary Li Qiang said at the mobilization meeting on Tuesday that the city will actively offer “multi-mode and multi-channel services” for foreign businesses to enter Chinese markets and develop the city into a hub to distribute imported goods across China and Asia.