KARACHI: As many as 85 per cent of Pakistani sellers on Alibaba.com, one of the largest global platforms for business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce, are based out of a single city: Sialkot.

Speaking at a sellers` summit organised by the international B2B platform on Thursday, Alibaba.com Pakistan Business Growth Manager Muhammad Sadiq said there`ve been 3.2 million listings from Pakistani sellers so far. The largest concentration of Pakistani sellers is in the apparel and clothing category with a 63pc share, followed by sports, entertainment, health, medical, tools, hardware and minerals categories.

Speakers from Alibaba.com highlighted multiple opportunities for Karachi-based exporters, manufacturers, wholesalers, traders and retailers to reach the digital B2B buyer base via the international platform. The summit resulted in 700-plus registrations.

Speaking via Zoom, company`s Country Head Song Song said Alibaba.com provides micro and small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) with a full range of digital, one-stop, integrated B2B services for global trade.

`Up to 70pc of global MSMEs have seen a sales decline and two-thirdshavereported their sales dropped by 40pc due to the global pandemic,` he said while highlighting the need for local companies to go international.

Pakistan`s B2B e-commerce market is expected to achieve an annual growth rate of 28pc in the coming three years, he said. The inflation-led recession, RussianUkraine war and oil scarcity have created some economic challenges. The rupee is getting weaker with respect to the dollar but growing exports is the best counter-measure for bringing the national economy back ontrack,he said.

`Pakistan has now become our top overseas supplier market in terms of the number of paying suppliers,` he said, encouraging the local businesses to grow beyond their home market and `get discovered by more than 40m-strong global online buyer community on Alibaba.

com`.

He lamented the fact that only 3.3pc of the total Pakistani exporters on Alibaba.com are from Karachi.

`These dynamics should change. I invite all exporters from Karachi to embrace the export e-commerce route, he said.