The Zhejiang Provincial Department of Commerce, the Zhejiang Provincial Department of Finance, and the Zhejiang Administration of Rural Revitalization jointly published a plan to outline concrete targets for the province's e-commerce demonstration counties to meet in the coming years.

The e-commerce demonstration counties (or county-level cities) are Wenling, Cangnan, Pinghu, Tonglu, Deqing, Longquan, Qingtian, Xianju, Lanxi, Xinchang, Dongyang, and Ruian.

According to the plan, 100 percent of the villages in the e-commerce demonstration counties will be accessible to at least three of China's mainstream providers of express delivery services, such as China Post, ZTO Express, Yunda Express, SF Express, STO Express, and YTO Express, by the end of this year.

By the end of 2022, 100 percent of the administrative villages in the e-commerce demonstration counties will have a separate e-commerce service station.

The province's online retail sales will reach 2.9 trillion yuan ($446 billion) in 2023, of which 150 billion yuan will be generated by agriculture products.

Substantial improvements will be made in the demonstration counties in terms of: their rural public service system for e-commerce; their logistics distribution system spanning counties, townships, and villages; as well as their entrepreneurship and employment situation in the e-commerce sector.

A villager in Ninghai county, Zhejiang province receives New Year celebration decorations at a rural Taobao shop. [Photo by Zhang Yongtao/For China Daily]