The Impact of Trade Facilitation on China's Provincial Cross-border E-commerce Operational Performance under the "Dual Circulation" Development Pattern

Based on the provincial perspective, this paper constructs and calculates China's provincial Trade Facilitation Index and cross-border e-commerce operation performance index, and further investigates the impact of China's provincial trade facilitation on the improvement of cross-border e-commerce operation performance (quality) and its regional differences. The study found that the Trade Facilitation Index has a significant positive enabling effect on the performance improvement of cross-border e-commerce in China, but the impact of the Trade Facilitation Index on the performance improvement of cross-border e-commerce in different regions of China has significant regional differences. The higher level of Trade Facilitation Index in the eastern region makes the operation performance of cross-border e-commerce higher, followed by the central region, and the western region is the weakest, which is characterized by the regional distribution of "the stronger the stronger, the weaker the weaker". At the same time, the operation performance of cross-border e-commerce is closely related to the level of foreign direct investment, the degree of regional opening to the outside world, whether there are pilot cities for cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zones, and the number of government policies to support the development of cross-border e-commerce. From the perspective of performance, a stronger level of foreign investment, a higher level of openness, a more intensive cross-border e-commerce pilot zone and more policy support for cross-border e-commerce development will achieve a higher level of cross-border e-commerce operation performance. Finally, the paper puts forward relevant policy suggestions on how to improve the level of trade facilitation and help improve the level of cross-border e-commerce operation in China from the four dimensions of the construction of the Trade Facilitation Index.