Express delivery at people's service

China, according to reports, may become the largest express delivery service country in 2014. But the fast growing express delivery sector still has many loopholes, as was evident last month when packages soaked in a deadly chemical killed one recipient in Shandong and left seven critically ill.

The growth of China's express delivery industry has been amazing. In the first 11 months of this year, the industry had delivered 8.12 billion packages, second only to the United States. The industry has grown at such a fast pace because of the astonishing development of e-commerce coupled with China's gift-giving tradition. The volume of e-commerce has grown from 10 billion yuan ($1.65 billion) in 2000 to about 10 trillion yuan in 2013, a 1,000 times increase.

According to data from Taobao and Tmall, on Nov 11 alone, more than 70 million packages were wrapped for delivery. Alibaba Group's figure show that the about 7 million shops on Tmall and Taobao need to send 5 million new packages every day. E-commerce indeed has been the greatest driving force for the express delivery industry.