E-commerce to play key role in poverty relief

China will push forward the use of e-commerce platforms to more than 60,000 impoverished villages in the next five years to aid its relief effort, a senior official said on Wednesday at a conference in Beijing on national poverty alleviation.

Liu Yongfu, head of the State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development, said the country will encourage residents in poor rural areas to open stores on major e-commerce platforms to distribute their agricultural produce.

The authority will select 1,500 poverty-stricken villages in 2015 for a e-commerce pilot project, Liu said.