Not long ago, a report jointly released by the Organizing Committee of the Global Digital Trade Expo and the International Trade Center (ITC) showed that the total global digital trade increased from $6.02 trillion in 2021 to $7.13 trillion in 2023, with an average annual growth rate of 8.8%. As an organic combination of digital technology and international trade, digital trade is a new form of international trade development, a new battleground for global economic and trade rule competition, and an important field for the development of the digital economy and a new engine for accelerating the cultivation of new quality productive forces.

China's digital trade has developed rapidly and has become one of the three pillars of foreign trade. In the first half of 2024, China's service trade that can be delivered digitally reached 1.42 trillion yuan, with a growth of 3.7%, and the total import and export of cross-border e-commerce was 1.22 trillion yuan, with a growth of 10.5%. The growth rate of digital trade far exceeds the overall growth rate of China's foreign trade during the same period, becoming a new highlight in foreign trade development, and its support for China's high-quality economic development and high-level opening up to the outside world is continuously strengthening. In-depth implementation of the spirit of the Third Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Party, China must firmly grasp the new opportunities of digital development, strengthen strategic deployment, keep pace with the times, promote the innovative development of digital trade, cultivate and enhance new competitive advantages in digital trade, and build a strong digital trade country.

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Strengthen the top-level design of digital trade. Improve the support policies in the field of digital trade, and take improving China's overall competitiveness in the digital economy as the priority goal for the innovative development of digital trade, and build and optimize the policy system and institutional framework for the innovative development of digital trade. Effectively promote the construction of "Digital Strong Trade", clarify the task list and support policy list for promoting the development of digital trade, and coordinate the innovative development of various fields of digital trade. Improve the legal system in the field of digital trade, encourage places with conditions to introduce local regulations on digital trade. Strengthen the construction of digital trade standardization technical organizations, accelerate the research, formulation, and revision of standards in the field of digital trade, and as soon as possible, formulate relevant standards in the fields of digital trade concept connotation, key industry classification and statistics, digital trade platform construction, data transaction and cross-border flow compliance, full-chain digitalization of trade, and digital trade public services.

Accelerate the innovation-driven development of digital trade. The level of technological development is one of the decisive factors for the international competitiveness of digital trade. It is necessary to continuously strengthen China's independent innovation capabilities, improve the innovation capabilities of cutting-edge technologies such as artificial intelligence, blockchain, cloud computing, and big data, and strive to achieve independent control of key core technologies. Increase the training of "digital technology + trade" talents, encourage colleges and universities to explore and innovate in talent training models, deepen cooperation between schools and enterprises, and between governments and enterprises, to provide composite talent support for the high-quality development of digital trade. Actively promote new types of digital trade, vigorously develop new types of digital trade driven by data elements and advanced digital technology, steadily promote the trade of digital technology, actively explore data trade, and seize the commanding heights of global digital trade development. It is necessary to cultivate leading enterprises in digital trade with strong innovation capabilities and international competitiveness, enhance the ability of enterprises to allocate resources and layout market networks globally, and at the same time, improve the penetration rate of digital technology in small and medium-sized enterprises, support small and medium-sized enterprises to take the path of specialization, refinement, and innovation, and cultivate small and medium-sized digital trade enterprises with high foreign orientation and unique competitive advantages in segmented fields, continuously enhancing the vitality of digital trade development.

Promote the institutional opening of digital trade. Accelerate the implementation of the results of domestic regulations on trade in services and e-commerce negotiations under the framework of the World Trade Organization, strengthen the connection between domestic and foreign regulations, and improve the level of liberalization and facilitation of digital trade. Build a high-level open platform for digital trade, scientifically plan and accelerate the construction of pilot demonstration zones for digital trade, bases for digital service exports, comprehensive pilot zones for cross-border e-commerce, "Silk Road e-commerce" cooperation pilot zones, and other platforms, explore the establishment of "Digital Trade Ports" and "Digital Free Trade Zones", build highlands and international hubs for digital trade opening, focus on institutional opening first, subject cultivation first, and mechanism cooperation first, continue to carry out pilot tests and stress tests for various reform and opening measures in the field of digital trade, and explore institutional and mechanism innovation. Accelerate the establishment of basic systems and standard specifications for data rights confirmation, transaction circulation, cross-border transmission, and security protection, explore a negative list-based cross-border flow plan, and provide support for conducting digital trade rule negotiations.

In addition, global digital trade rules show a trend of differentiation, and there is a risk of governance fragmentation, which is not conducive to the stable development of digital trade and the world economy. There is an urgent need to strengthen international coordination and cooperation to jointly build a favorable institutional environment for the development of digital globalization. China must adhere to rule-oriented and multilateral governance models, actively participate in the formulation of digital trade-related rules in different international organizations, deepen multilateral and bilateral and regional digital trade dialogues and cooperation with various countries and regional groups, and accelerate the formation of standard rules that meet the interests of all parties, promote the construction of the global digital trade governance system, and jointly create an environment conducive to the rapid development of digital trade.