Mandatory labeling of Chinese products? Amazon is required to make corrections

Let’s start today’s main text.

Last week, there was a big news that shocked all of us Chinese sellers. The Indian government directly banned dozens of Chinese apps, including TikTok, UC Browser, WeChat, Weibo, etc. This is mainly because the relationship between China and India has been very tense recently, and there was even a conflict on the border. Now anti-China sentiment in India is on the rise, and many sellers are worried whether it will affect the products on Amazon India.

Recently, the Indian government announced that it would force e-commerce platforms such as Amazon to indicate the country of origin of products, especially for products that are "Made in China". After banning Chinese apps, this move by the Indian government has forced sellers to be more vigilant.

The Indian government’s policy of mandating the origin of products is obviously due to the recent conflict between China and India. India has also set a deadline for Amazon to force all new products to be marked with the origin after August 1, and all old products to be marked with the origin before October 1.

According to current Indian law, there is no regulation on whether the country of origin needs to be displayed in online product descriptions, so Amazon and other e-commerce platforms have negotiated with the government over this policy, and Amazon even proposed a 2-3 month buffer period. However, after the meeting, the government still decided to "keep the original date", which means that sellers only have half a month to prepare.

Not only that, the Indian government also said that it may review the legal packaging rules for pre-packaged products after implementing this policy. It may require that the product packaging be printed with the country of origin, manufacturing date, quantity, expiration date (if any) and manufacturer details.

India can now ban Chinese apps, and in the future it can also ban/sell Chinese products. The mandatory requirement for e-commerce websites to mark the origin may be paving the way for this. Even if the government does not formally ban Chinese products, it can incite domestic consumers not to buy them.

So even though my brother-in-law attaches great importance to the Indian market and has recently invested a large sum of money to improve the local distribution system in India, the business environment is really bad, and sellers with Indian stores should be more careful.

Chinese apps have been having a really bad time going overseas recently. Even Amazon has stepped in to intervene and told its employees not to use TikTok.

Over the weekend, Amazon sent an email to all employees stating that "employees should not use TikTok on devices that are logged into an Amazon email account."

The content of the email is nothing more than some conspiracy theories about data collection, but there is still a noteworthy piece of information in this email - the US government or companies are very likely to voluntarily ban programs such as TikTok, and mentioned that this may make some sellers who have invested in advertising on it feel nervous.

Indeed, as a social media platform, TikTok has recently become a new option for off-site sellers. In addition, it is also aggressively conquering overseas markets and has seized a lot of market share. More and more sellers are willing to try to place advertisements or operate accounts on TikTok.

Whether it is the government or Amazon, banning TikTok is a hassle for us sellers. Not only will the investment of sellers outside the site in TikTok go down the drain, but it also means that the United States will further escalate its boycott of Chinese products.

At present, the United States is still busy dealing with domestic protests and demonstrations, and with the resurgence of the epidemic, it is estimated that it will be difficult for it to free up its hands to systematically boycott Chinese products. However, I think the overseas version of TikTok is still in jeopardy. Recently, US Secretary of State Pompeo also made a tough statement to take action against Chinese applications (mainly TikTok).

So if you want to use social media to expand your traffic recently, it’s best to bypass this platform.