Frontiers in Business, Economics and Management ISSN: 2766-824X | Vol. 19, No. 2, 2025 273 Study on the Impact of Cross-border E-commerce Development on China's Export Trade in “Silk Road E- commerce” Trading Partner Countries Junxian Cai, Lehua Chen * Foshan university, FoShan, China * Corresponding author: Lehua Chen (Email: 2714111247@qq.com) Abstract: In the context of globalization and digitalization, cross-border e-commerce has developed rapidly and become an important driving force for international trade. The “Silk Road E-commerce” cooperation under the “Belt and Road” initiative has brought new opportunities for trade between China and the countries along the route. The purpose of this paper is to stud y the impact of cross-border e-commerce development of trading partner countries on China's import and export trade, by sorting out the development history and status quo, constructing an evaluation system, empirically analyzing the impact effects and impact paths, and putting forward targeted policy recommendations to promote the development of China's impo rt and export trade and help the in-depth implementation of the “One Belt, One Road” Initiative. Keywords: Cross-border e-commerce; Trading partner countries; Import and export trade; Silk Road e-commerce. 1. Introduction Since the “Belt and Road” initiative was put forward, trade between China and the countries along the route has become increasingly close, which not only opens up a broader foreign consumer market for China, but also plays the role of regional radiation and drives the economic development of the countries along the route. Countries along the “Belt and Road” are important trading partners of China, therefore, exploring the potential of trade between China and the countries along the route and boosting the further development of China's foreign trade is an important issue in the current context. “Silk Road E-commerce” is an important initiative to actively promote international cooperation in e-commerce under the framework of the Belt and Road Initiative by giving full play to China's advantages in e-commerce technology application, model innovation and market scale. The “Silk Road E-commerce” Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) is an important initiative for China to cooperate with relevant countries in the field of cross-border e-commerce. By signing this memorandum with trading partner countries, it aims to strengthen cooperation between the two sides in e-commerce policy coordination, infrastructure construction, enterprise cooperation and other aspects, and promote the healthy development of cross-border e-commerce between the two sides. Therefore, in such a context, it is of great theoretical and practical significance to conduct an in-depth study on the impact of cross-border e-commerce development in trading partner countries on China's import and export trade. 2. Literature Review At present, there have been many academic studies on the development of cross-border e-commerce in the trading partner countries of the “Silk Road E-commerce”, and the impact of the development of cross-border e-commerce on China's export trade from the perspective of the trading partner countries has also been discussed in depth, and the mainstream viewpoints are that the development of China's export trade is mainly promoted through the lowering of trade costs, lowering the cost of communication and exchange. The mainstream view is that it mainly promotes the development of China's export trade by reducing trade costs and communication costs. 2.1. Study on the Impact of Cross-Border E- Commerce in Trading Partner Countries on China's Export Trade 2.1.1. Reducing the cost of bilateral trade In the traditional trade mode, due to the existence of time and space barriers between China and its trading partners, it is difficult to obtain information when trading, which limits the development of import and export trade between China and its partners. The development of cross-border e- commerce can effectively solve this problem, cross-border e- commerce platform through the information network timely release or search for commodity supply and demand, price and other information, so that the two sides can be more efficient, fast and accurate access to market information, effectively reducing the fixed costs of the trade process, prompting more frequent trade transactions between the two sides, so that the scale of the international trade market transactions can be rapidly expanded (Wang Wei, 2024). As another example, cross-border e-commerce reduces fixed costs (e.g., market size) in international trade, but is more sensitive to variable costs (e.g., tariffs), and cross-border e- commerce also helps overcome the fixed costs of production, and is more sensitive to the variable costs of production (e.g., labor costs) (Xue-Nan Ju et al., 2020). 2.1.2. Reduced communication information costs The development of information and communication technology allows trading parties to sign digital contracts directly, realizing high-quality and high-efficiency digital communication, reducing the communication cost of cross- border e-commerce exports and effectively reducing the time cost in traditional trade, and improving the efficiency of communication (Wang Yan and Xiaodan, 2024). Cross-border e-commerce platforms connect the world into a unified big 274 market, which can provide relatively perfect and symmetrical supply and demand information (Guo Swei et al., 2018). On the one hand, both large search engine websites such as Google and Baidu, as well as the internal search engine of cross-border e-commerce platforms, can guide buyers to the page of the desired product through the keyword information entered by the user, thus greatly reducing the search cost (Bakos, 1997; Ellison & Ellison, 2009; Jiang Xiaojuan, 2017; Dinerstein etal.,2018). 2.2. Study on the Silk Road E-commerce Cooperation to Enhance the Development Environment of Cross-border E-commerce With the promotion of “Silk Road E-commerce” cooperation, experience sharing between government and enterprises, policy synergy and infrastructure connectivity have further enhanced the development environment for cross-border e-commerce. 2.2.1. Promoted the exchange of experience between government and enterprises International cooperation on “Silk Road E-commerce” has explored a rich variety of new modes of cooperation, such as cloud exhibitions, cloud lectures, government-enterprise dialogues, special shopping festivals, and other “Silk Road E- commerce” activities that have continuously enriched the content of e-commerce cooperation (Wang Yuanyuan, 2022). For example, under the global impact of the Xinguang epidemic, China has organized domestic experts to set up a number of “Silk Road E-commerce” lectures on the cloud to help government officials and e-commerce practitioners in partner countries to master the knowledge and skills of policies and regulations, development trends and innovative practices through live lectures (Li Ning, 2022). Since the establishment of the Silk Road E-commerce cooperation mechanism, China has organized several Silk Road E- commerce government-enterprise dialogues in Hangzhou, Xiamen, Harbin, Chengdu, and Shijiazhuang, where the level of e-commerce development is relatively high, creating not only a platform for governments to share their practical experience of digital trade, but also a platform for governments to share their experience of digital trade. This not only creates a platform for the government to share China's practical experience in digital trade, but also provides an opportunity for domestic and foreign e-commerce enterprises to learn more about China's digital support policies and advantages in the digital industry. 2.2.2. Policy synergies advanced Zhang Qilin and Wang Xuhui (2021) pointed out that the information asymmetry and institutional differences in the transaction process of cross-border e-commerce can lead to transaction disputes, and revealed the evolutionary dynamics of different governance modes from the perspective of matching the demand for governance and the supply of governance. Bieron & Ahmed (2012) pointed out that the differences in the laws and regulations between countries have made the narrow interpretation of intellectual property rights laws in some countries impede the cross-border e- commerce activities. As of October 2023, China has established international cooperation mechanisms for e- commerce with 30 countries, and the partners of “Silk Road E-commerce” cover five continents (see Table 1). Meanwhile, the Global Cross-Border E-Commerce Conference has been held in Zhengzhou for seven consecutive sessions since 2017, building a policy communication platform for digital cooperation between China and partner countries. In the “Silk Road E-commerce” International Cooperation Summit Forum organized by the conference, government representatives, experts and scholars from Argentina, Hungary and other “Silk Road E-commerce” partner countries, as well as international digital enterprises such as Alibaba Group, Jingdong International, eBay, and so on, focused on the “Silk Road E-commerce” international cooperation and the “Silk Road E-commerce” international cooperation platform. In the “Silk Road E-commerce” international cooperation summit, government representatives, experts and scholars from Argentina, Hungary and other “Silk Road E-commerce” partner countries, as well as international digital enterprises such as Alibaba Group, Jingdong International, eBay, etc., focused on the new opportunities and challenges of international cooperation on “Silk Road E-commerce”, and discussed in- depth the areas and development direction of bilateral digital cooperation, which provided a basis for improving the understanding of bilateral digital policies and realizing the docking of the planning (Ye Shixiong and Cai Yiming, 2024). 3. Methodology There is little literature focusing on the perspective of trading partner countries and “Silk Road E-commerce” to explore whether the development of cross-border e- commerce in other countries affects the level of China's import and export trade. At present, domestic research on the development of cross-border e-commerce in Silk Road e- commerce trading partner countries has yet to be further expanded and enriched to explore its impact on China's export trade. This paper intends to first sort out the development history and status of cross-border e-commerce in major trading partner countries, and construct a comprehensive evaluation system of cross-border e-commerce development level to measure the cross-border e-commerce development level of major trading partner countries. Subsequently, the main trading partner countries of “Silk Road E-commerce” cooperation are selected as research objects to empirically analyze the impact of cross-border e-commerce development of trading partner countries on the development level of China's import and export trade. Then, we further analyze the impact of cross-border e-commerce development on China's import and export trade in the trading partner countries of “Silk Road E-commerce” cooperation. Finally, targeted policy recommendations based on the research results are proposed to optimize cross-border e-commerce cooperation and import and export trade between China and its trading partner countries. 3.1. Research Design 3.1.1. Model building This study adopts the gravity model as the basic model, which is often used to analyze the relationship between international trade flows and influencing factors. On this basis, the level of cross-border e-commerce development of “Silk Road E-commerce” trading partner countries is introduced as the core explanatory variable to reflect its impact on China's import and export trade. At the same time, other factors that may affect the import and export trade, such as economic size, population size, geographic distance, trade policy, etc., are controlled. 275 (1) Basic gravitational model formulas: (1) The Tradeij denotes the total amount of imports and exports between country i (China) and country j (the trading partner country), GDPi and GDPj are the size of the economy, Distanceij is the geographic distance, and Xij is other control variables. (2) Extension of the model (introduction of the “Silk Road E-commerce” variable): (2) 3.1.2. Variable description (1) Explanatory variable: ln (Tradeijt) China and trading partner countries j in year t Total amount of imports and exports with trading partner country j in year t (in logarithms). (2) Core explanatory variables: (Ecomjt) Trading partner countries j's level of cross-border e- commerce development in year t (composite index or single proxy variable). (3) Control variable: ln (Gdpjt): Trading partner country j In year GDP in year t (logarithmic). Ln (Popjt): Trading partner country j in year Population size in year t (logarithmic). Ln (Distanceij): China and trading partner countries j Geographic distance. Policyjt: Trade policy dummy variables (e.g. “1” for FTAs, “0” vice versa) 3.1.3. Data sources Table 1. Baseline Regression Results Data such as cross-border e-commerce turnover and the number of cross-border e-commerce enterprises can be sourced from the statistical data of the National Bureau of Statistics, the General Administration of Customs, and other official agencies; data such as total import and export trade can be obtained from international organizations such as the United Nations Trade Database; and data on control variables such as the size of the economy and the size of the population can be referred to the relevant information released by the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and so on. Table 2. Robustness Checks 4. Result 4.1. Core Variable: E-commerce Development Level 4.1.1. Significance & Magnitude The coefficient of 0.142 (significant at the 1% level) indicates that a 1-unit increase in a partner country’s e- commerce development level (e.g., a 1% rise in the composite index) is associated with a 14.2% increase in China’s exports to that country. 4.1.2. Mechanism E-commerce reduces information asymmetry, streamlines cross-border transactions, and enhances market access for Chinese goods, particularly in regions with underdeveloped traditional trade channels. 4.2. Control Variables 4.2.1. Partner Country GDP The coefficient of 0.623 (significant at 1%) aligns with gravity model predictions. A 1% increase in a partner country’s GDP boosts China’s exports by approximately 0.6%, reflecting stronger demand from larger economies. 4.2.2. Geographic Distance The negative coefficient (-0.076) confirms that distance remains a trade barrier, though its effect is modest compared to historical patterns, likely due to advancements in logistics and digital trade. 4.2.3. Free Trade Agreements (FTA) The 0.285 coefficient (1% significance) underscores the importance of policy coordination. FTAs reduce trade costs and institutional barriers, amplifying export growth. 4.2.4. Population The insignificant coefficient (0.021) suggests that population size alone does not guarantee export growth, particularly in low-income countries where purchasing power may lag behind population size. 5. Conclusion 5.1. Key Findings This study extends the gravity model to examine how e- commerce development in "Digital Silk Road" partner countries affects China’s export trade. The results reveal: 5.1.1. E-commerce significantly boosts exports A 1-unit increase in partner countries’ e-commerce development raises China’s exports by 14.2% on average. 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