Saudi Arabia has climbed three places on the United Nations Electronic Commerce Organization Index, rising from 52 in 2018 to 49 this year. Ukraine fell on the ladder of the index to take the old site of Saudi Arabia (52).
The United Nations Trade and Development Organization (UNCTAD) today estimated the value of global e-commerce at $ 3.9 trillion globally in 2017 (the latest official statistic), an increase of 22 percent over the previous year.
In 2017, about 1.3 billion people, or a quarter of the world's population aged 15 and older, went online shopping, up 12 percent from 2016.
The UNCTAD index ranks the willingness of 152 countries to engage in online commerce, each country's access to secure Internet servers, the reliability of postal services and infrastructure, the proportion of their population using the Internet, and the proportion of individuals who have an account with a financial institution or mobile payment service. Mobile phone, for example.
And Saudi Arabia has achieved a high rank in the standard proportion of the population who use the Internet (93 percent), which is equivalent to the center in the 13th world. And it achieved 81 points from 100 in the reliability of the standard postal services and infrastructure, which is equivalent to the 38th place globally, and 72 per cent of the population who have an account with a financial institution or providers of payment mobile service for the money through the mobile phone, which is equivalent to rank the world's 57.
Saudi Arabia could have risen to the top of the e-commerce rankings had it not been for modest scores (47 out of a hundred) in the field of secure Internet servers, a figure that ranked 91st out of 152 countries.
Saudi Arabia emerged ranked ninth among the ten developing countries that have the highest scores on the classification of e-commerce. All these countries from Asia and are classified as high-income economies or higher middle-income countries. At the other end of the peace, it occupies the least developed countries, 18 of the 20 lower centers.
European countries ranked eight of the top ten on the index, leaving Europe so far the region most prepared for e-commerce.
For the second year in a row, the Netherlands leads the e-commerce index, followed by Switzerland second, Finland in fourth place, followed by Britain, Denmark, Norway, Ireland, and Germany in ninth place. The only countries outside of the old continent, which presence in the top ten are Singapore (three) and Australia (tenth).
While 18 countries, including Saudi Arabia, have achieved more than 90 percent of their Internet population, the percentage drops to 3 percent in Burundi, 5 percent in Niger, 7 percent in Chad and 8 percent in Liberia and the Islands moon, and 9 percent in both the Congo and the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sierra Leone. And occupied all these countries down the classification of e-commerce.
Seven countries accounted for between 99.5 and 100 percent of the population with an account with a financial institution or mobile payment service - that is, almost all people in these countries have the ability to pay by telephone. These countries include the Netherlands, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Australia - all in the top ten - and Sweden (18th).
The 2019 edition of the index includes noticeable changes from the previous year. Iceland, New Zealand, and Sweden are out of the top ten because of their low scores for secure servers and postal reliability (this indicator has particularly hindered Iceland's performance). Sweden has also seen a decline in the proportion of its population using the Internet. Finland replaced the three countries (jumping from 12th to 4th), Germany (16th to 9th) and Australia (11th to 10th).
Regarding the list of the top ten developing economies, the main change was Chile's exit from the group. But despite this, they have remained at the forefront of the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean. Mauritius achieved the best points in South Africa, the Arab countries. Belarus got the highest marks among the economies in transition.
The UNCTAD indicator also highlights the need to improve the reliability and availability of statistics, particularly in developing countries. For example, Internet user data for 2018 was available to less than half of the countries at the time of indicator calculations. The latest data on bank accounts and mobile payment service date back to 2017.
UNCTAD says countries that are less prepared for the digital economy usually have less statistical information to help policymakers make informed decisions.
More than 40 countries are represented at the two-day meeting, which includes more than 100 participants from statisticians, government officials and representatives of international organizations such as the International Telecommunication Union, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the World Trade Organization, the Universal Postal Union and the Statistical Commission of the European Union.
The group will present the results of its discussions to the UNCTAD Group of Governmental Experts on E-Commerce and Digital Economy, which is held each year during the E-Commerce Week in Geneva.
The next edition of e-commerce is scheduled to be released on 1 May 2020. Since 2016, UNCTAD has completed 20 such assessments with the support of ITFC, Germany and other bodies.
