Dear readers

The New Year jubilation started to quench as holidaymakers shuffled back to office for desk pileups，business resumed， phone call heard， e-mails answered， meetings summoned and trips planned. Amid the hustle and bustle， attention is drawn to a snow-covered， mountain-enclosed small town Davos in Switzerland， where the 48th World Economic Forum Annual Meeting is convened，as scheduled on January 23 - 26 with the leitmotif of Creating a Shared Future in a Fractured World.

A fractured world can be seamed together through cyber infrastructure activated by the state-ofthe-art internet technology to ensure digital connectivity， making it possible to create a shared future， regardless of geographical hindrance ， economic disparity and cultural difference. The World Economic Forum has systemic initiatives， addressing the issues of global impact and primary concerns，“Shaping the Future of Digital Economy and Society” is one of these priorities， and continues to be a Davos hit in WEF2018 as I have just learned that Jack Ma， Alibaba Group Executive Chairman， attends this years Davos get- together to announce an initiative for “Enabling E-Commerce”， backed up by the World Economic Forum， World Trade Organization （WTO） and the Electronic World Trade Platforms （e-WTP） which was proposed at G20 Summit in Hangzhou last year and included in G20 Leaders Communique. The e-WTP was established for the purpose of providing easy trade flows for global SMEs by supports from governments in the world to dismantle trade barriers， and by shortening supply chains at the reduced cost and increased efficiency.

E-commerce in China is heading on quite rapidly， so is it with its textile economy in e-commerce growth. According to the latest report issued in January by Ministry of Commerce， the first half of 2017 witnessed 3.6 trillion yuan in cross-boarder e-trading business， up by 30.7 percent as against the same period of the year before， already a new avenue for Chinas import and export growth. Ecommerce in textile economy grew up to 4.45 trillion yuan in 2016， 2.4 times higher than 2012. In ecommerce retails， on-line sales grew by 19.6 percent， far better than the bricks-and-mortar shop sales that registered only 7.3 percent increase.

Chinas government is striving for innovative growth model that creates digital economy by capitalizing on data factor and promoting co-existent development of both real and virtue economies. With this in mind， China is investing heavily in building a cyber-resilient， high-speed，mobile and ubiquitous new-generation digitalization infrastructure， making sure that China continues to stay competitive in the new era.

Alibabas e-WTP is part of the efforts on private sector side to digitalize world trade on an innovative platform to address “winners-take-most” scenario by providing SMEs with easy access to equal opportunities to benefit from the digitalization era， which complements national strategy just as it does the World Trade Organization.

ZHAO Hong， Editor-in-Chief

January， 2018endprint