To promote the innovative and high-quality development of foreign trade, and consolidate the fundamentals of foreign trade and foreign investments, Shandong Province has recently issued an important guiding document for foreign trade: Action Plan of Shandong Province for Innovative Development of Foreign Trade (2021-2022). The Plan puts forward conspicuous new business types and models such as the action of improving new foreign trade business, accelerating the development of cross-border e-commerce, market purchase trade, comprehensive foreign trade service and overseas warehouse.

Helping enterprises find agents through online and offline negotiations

At the 2021 China (Shandong) Brand Fair (Central and Eastern Europe) that took place on November 24, 2021, Booth 44 of Qingdao Udine Rubber Plastic Co., Ltd. received two professional visitors from Hungary. With the help of "exhibitor agent" Zhang Zhaochun, the company found its Hungarian national agent after a one-hour negotiation with the foreign merchants. 

According to Tian Hongbing, General Manager of China-Europe Trade and Logistics Cooperation Park Co., Ltd., this is an innovative foreign trade exhibition in Shandong.

"Participation by proxy": "Thanks to the release of the new policy, 'participation by proxy' is a new step forward from previous 'virtual exhibition'," said Tian. "The combination of Eovobo's newly-developed convention & exhibition system and ZOOM with direct product access has led to a leap of the exhibition from online negotiation."

The policy mentioned by Tian is the Action Plan of Shandong Province for Innovative Development of Foreign Trade (2021-2022) (Plan) issued by the People's Government of Shandong Province in September 2021. The Plan proposes efforts to promote the innovative development of Shandong's foreign trade by ensuring unimpeded trade, implementing a strategy of importing and exporting to the best advantage, improving new foreign trade business and integrating trade industries.

According to the Plan, Shandong will develop overseas markets through 100 exhibitions, host the Japan, South Korea and RCEP (Shandong) import expositions, build "Shandong Commodity Online Exhibition Hall", and create online and offline commodity exhibition platforms for overseas warehouses, so as to further optimize its global market layout and improve the level of customs clearance facilitation; Shandong will expand imports of advanced technologies and equipment, and raise the proportion of import interest subsidies for key technologies, equipment and parts in its ten superior industries, to further improve import and export quality and efficiency; Shandong will develop new business such as cross-border e-commerce and market purchase, and innovatively develop trade in services, to further develop new foreign trade business; and Shandong will improve its foreign trade industry and supply chains to further integrate trade industries.

"Since the beginning of this year, we have innovatively applied online and offline exhibition models such as virtual exhibition, online long-term demonstration and 'participation by proxy', to develop markets," according to a head of the Department of Commerce of Shandong Province. "Shandong has organized a total of 27 exhibitions abroad with the participation of 3,700 enterprises, achieving a total intended transaction volume of 1.25 billion yuan."