Gaolan offers lavish awards for e-commerce growth

E-commerce development in the Gaolan Port Economic Zone of Zhuhai will be boosted by generous rewards for top-performing service delivery and purchasing units, and related training, according to a recent implementation plan.

Any cross-border e-commerce provider in the zone that records more than $10 million in annual sales volume will receive a one-time award of 1 million yuan ($156,490), according to the Administrative Committee of the zone.

Cross-border e-commerce enterprises will receive one-time subsidies of 200,000 yuan ($31,300), 500,000 yuan ($78,245), or 1 million yuan each for annual import and export volume surpassing $10 million, $50 million, or $100 million for the first time. More than that, if momentum continues in ensuing years to exceed $1 million in annual import-export volume with increases of 20, 30, or 40 percent, further incentives of 200,000 yuan, 300,000 yuan ($46,950), and 500,000 yuan each will be available.

The plan stipulates that enterprises will be subsidized up to half the fees paid to business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-customer (B2C) services from a third-party organization, with an upper limit of 50,000 yuan ($7,825) per year.

Traditional industries such as production manufacturing, commodity circulation, and cultural tourism are also encouraged to pursue e-commerce marketing to expand sales. For them, no matter what kind of platform they rely upon, self-built or third-party, they will be awarded up to 100,000 yuan if annual online sales volume exceeds 5 million yuan ($782,450) for the first time based on year-on-year growth rate of more than 20 percent.

If the enterprises grow at the same rate or higher in the following years and achieve between 5 million yuan and 10 million yuan, they can receive a maximum of 50,000 yuan. Likewise, enterprises that reach 10 million yuan in annual online sales volume for the first time will be granted up to 300,000 yuan. Follow-up annual online sales volumes, if kept above 10 million yuan with a growth rate of more than 20 percent, will lead to issuance of up to 150,000 yuan ($23,475).

E-commerce service providers in the zone will be another beneficiary. They will be given one-off grants of 100,000 yuan, 200,000 yuan and 500,000 yuan respectively after their service charge incomes exceed 1 million yuan, 3 million yuan ($469,470), and 50 million yuan ($782,450).

Those named a Top 10 Platform, Top 100 Mall, or Top 1000 Online Store in an online marketing event sponsored by the Guangdong provincial government will be given one-time incentives of 500,000 yuan, 100,000 yuan ($15,649), and 200,000 yuan each.

In addition, training agencies aimed at e-commerce skills improvement and approved by Gaolan's Modern Industry Development Bureau will have their actual training expenses subsidized up to 50,000 yuan.

Talents will be brought in and cultivated to support the development program.