Business giants tap rural e-commerce market

Zhao Yanfeng, general manager of Yateer Holding Group Co, Ltd in east China's Shandong province, said his company is also considering investing in building an online platform to provide financing services and customers for farmers.

In October, Alibaba announced a plan to invest 10 billion yuan to build 1,000 county-level operation centers and 100,000 village-level service stations to tap the rural e-commerce market in three to five years.

Jingdong, another leading online retailer, said it has set up more than 100 county-level service centers covering more than 10,000 villages.

Booming e-commerce is conducive to better agricultural produce and higher rural consumption and also attracts entrepreneurial talent to rural areas, said Yu Xin'an, president of Henan Academy of Social Sciences.

"It is inevitable that more capital will go to agriculture and boost its modernization," said Zheng Fengtian, a professor in rural studies at Renmin University of China.