Concerned customers who purchase Australian beef on Chinese ecommerce platform JD.com can now access information about every step of the meat’s journey through the supply chain, stored on JD’s own blockchain, or digital ledger.
The innovation is an example of novel ways China’s ecommerce retailers, once stereotyped as selling cheap and shoddy goods, are evolving to meet more discerning and upscale preferences of Chinese consumers.
China’s consumer base is vast but online retailers are locked in furious competition: Alibaba’s Taobao, Taobao spin-off Tmall, Tencent’s WeChat stores and JD.com are all vying for more eyeballs and sales volume. Trust in products and reliable delivery have become key advantages as they face-off with each other for a greater stake in an online retail market worth Rmb7.18tn in sales ($1.12tn) last year alone, according to China’s commerce ministry.