Export Bahrain launches national e-commerce initiative
Export Bahrain, a lead initiative of the national SME Development Board, launched a national e-commerce initiative on 23 September, which is designed to promote a borderless marketplace for products and services made in Bahrain.
To support the objectives of this new initiative, Export Bahrain has established exclusive partnership agreements with a growing list of prominent e-commerce platforms that are designed to provide highly competitive cost savings and incentives to businesses listing their products and services.
All businesses based in Bahrain, especially SMEs, with products and services that are made in Bahrain are able to take advantage of this new initiative that will provide further visibility to their company and services to local and international audiences.
Chief executive Dr Nasser Qaedi said Export Bahrain had agreements in place with multiple prominent and well established platforms and was seeking to grow this to eventually have exclusive agreements with the majority of platforms available locally and globally. Export Bahrain would work with businesses to select and utilise the e-commerce platforms that would be most advantageous to them.
“Through its exclusive partnerships, Export Bahrain’s e-commerce initiative will provide unprecedented advantages to Bahrain-based businesses seeking to list their products and services on e-commerce platforms,” said Dr Qaedi. “The support provided will reduce, and in many instances eliminate, costs associated with listing fees, commissions and multiple other areas to provide tangible competitive cost advantages to businesses where costs of up to 100% will be eliminated depending on the e-commerce platform.”
The launch of the national e-commerce support initiative is part of series of new products and services that have been launched in 2020 by Export Bahrain to assist businesses overcome challenges and take advantage of new growth opportunities.
“Combined with Export Bahrain’s shipping and logistics support solution, export facilitation, deal facilitation, export credit insurance and many other services, the e-commerce solution will significantly boost the competitiveness of Bahrain produced products and services globally and help lower costs while securing new business opportunities. We hope that this will continue to provide momentum to businesses across Bahrain as they position their services online to expand their customer reach and encourage businesses to explore these opportunities and more with Export Bahrain,” Dr Qaedi added.
With a population of approximately 1.6 million people, and over 1.5 million internet users, Bahrain has the highest internet penetration rate in the Middle East (98%). Competitive prices for broadband have also led to high levels of mobile internet penetration.
In March, the Bahraini e-commerce platform HOMIEZ announced that it would offer BenefitPay, the national e-wallet payment system, as a payment method to 150+ vendors currently on the platform. BenefitPay provides the means to streamline payments in the Kingdom of Bahrain and allows consumers and merchants to transact without the use of cash or cards.
