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China Urges Better Legislation on E-commerce
Chinese governmental officials and experts proposed Thursday that it is urgent to build a better legal system for protecting business activities in electronic commerce.
At the Fifth China International Electronic Commerce Summit, which started Thursday morning, Li Shishi, deputy director of the State Council's Legislative Affairs Office, said that different from the traditional face-to-face commercial mode, electronic commerce has no territorial limits, which is also a challenge for judicial bodies.
Many countries in the world are now focusing on formulating laws and regulations on electronic contracts, affirmation of identities, assurance of payment, security of trade and settlement of disputes, Li said.
Statistics show that by the end of 2000, China had more than 1, 000 websites featuring e-commerce and roughly 25 million Internet subscribers. In 1999, the trade volume of e-commerce reached 40 million U.S. dollars.
China has adopted more than 30 laws and regulations, including the telecommunications ordinance, the decision of the National People's Congress Standing Committee on the safety of Internet, the regulation on web information, and the temporary provisions on online securities transactions.
China is now making more efforts to improve its existing legal system on e-commerce standardization, Li said.
Zhou Qi, a partnership lawyer at Beijing Gonghe Law Office, was more concerned about e-commerce's impact on consumers. He urged that when the building of uniform legal mechanisms on electronic commerce is considered, the authorities should pay more attention to common consumers.
Experts estimated that the Asian and Pacific Region would be the fastest user of the electronic commerce. They predicted that by the end of 2003, the annual revenue of China's online business will reach 3.8 billion US dollars.
China to Further Promote E-CommerceChina will further promote e-commerce in the next five years, by creating a better technological, network, business and legal environment for it, said Minister of Information Industry Wu Jichuan Thursday.
The Chinese government attaches importance to the development of e-commerce, Wu said at the Fifth China International E-commerce Conference which began Thursday. In the newly issued Tenth Five- Year Plan for 2001-2005, China has projected definite targets of speeding up the establishment of a digital authentication system and electronic payment system.
According to the minister, e-commerce will be mainly used in the banking, foreign trade, customs, railway, civil aviation, shipping, automotive and building materials industries.
The minister agreed that China's e-commerce still has a long way to go although it has experienced rapid growth in recent years.
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