E-commerce giant, Alibaba, has struck a deal with the Australian Trade and Investment Commission (Austrade), which will expand the variety of products sold to Chinese consumers through its online platforms.
Under the agreement, Alibaba will introduce an annual “Australian Fresh Food Week” sales promotion and education event on Tmall Fresh, Tmall’s fresh food channel, advancing the interests of Australian companies that export dairy, meat, seafood, fruit and other fresh produce, among others.
Alibaba also plans on establishing a channel on Youku.com, a leading provider of video and streaming services in China with over 500 million monthly active users, to further promote fresh Australian produce.
Alibaba markets have more than 434 million users and take 12.7 billion orders each year.
There are already more than 1300 Australian brands on the two online platforms, 80 per cent of which had never before reached the Chinese market.
A promotion for New Zealand oysters last year saw 50,000 sold online in one day, with buyers able to track the temperature of the oysters on a mobile phone app from NZ to China.
Chemist Warehouse was the first Tmall Global merchant to reach $2 million in sales on one day during the 2015 “global shopping festival”.
The signing of the agreement was witnessed at a ceremony at Alibaba’s corporate headquarters in Hangzhou by Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Jack Ma, Alibaba Group’s founder and executive chairman.
“The next chapter of trade between China and Australia will require closer cooperation and this agreement provides a new framework to ensure more businesses, especially small and medium enterprises, can benefit through the partnership between Austrade and Alibaba,” Ma said.
According to Turnbull, Alibaba can help the smallest businesses, “the mom-and-dad businesses, in the regional part of Australia to have access to the biggest part of the world, something that hitherto only a very large company with enormous resources, with enormous representation would be able to do”.
“It’s a liberating force for small business. And because so many of the services are available on the cloud, again it reduces the cost of business and levels the playing field between the big company and the small company,” Turnbull added.
Maggie Zhou, managing director of Alibaba Australia and New Zealand, said Australia is a key market for the e-commerce giant and the new deal supported Australian exporters looking to capitalise on the expanding middle class in China.
“With Alibaba Group’s new Melbourne office opening later this year, our local team will be dedicated to providing businesses the information and tools they need to advance their international growth,” she said.
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