E-commerce offers development opportunities

With more than 450 million Internet users in China, which is about 50 percent more than the entire population of the United States, discussion regarding e-commerce development was certain to come up during the annual sessions of the National People's Congress (NPC) and the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) National Committee.

E-commerce is the next economic frontier to many, and China is now leading the pack in terms of maximizing the potential of the Internet compared with Western countries.

In the US, Amazon.com Inc, a major online retailer, was founded in 1994, Yahoo! Inc, one of the earlier Web portals, started operations in 1995, as did online auction website eBay Inc.