Focus on the 2025 Nordic Forum: Hubei Establishes New E-commerce Channel from Ezhou to Northern Europe

“As mature markets like Europe and America are restructuring trade rules through policy adjustments, the five Nordic countries have become an important growth market for Chinese cross-border e-commerce expansion.” At the 2025 China-Nordic Economic and Trade Cooperation Forum and China-Europe Business Innovation and Hubei Industry Matchmaking Conference, the Chairman of the China Cross-border E-commerce 50 Forum stated that the Nordic e-commerce market is in a critical stage of “rapid growth and structural optimization,” expected to break through scale bottlenecks, during which Hubei has great potential.

“The drone has a long battery life and a stable signal……” At the Ezhou Cross-border E-commerce Industrial Park, a Pakistani host was recommending drones to European and American consumers in a TikTok live stream; meanwhile, at the “Nordic Quality Life Pavilion” in Wuhan, specialty products like Norwegian salmon and Swedish vodka continue to sell well—these vivid scenes are clear examples of the vigorous development of Chinese cross-border e-commerce.

The chairman explained that the five Nordic countries have a 95% IoT penetration rate, mature e-commerce infrastructure, and 83% of consumers have made online purchases in the past month, with China being one of their main sources of cross-border goods. In July this year, cross-border orders from China to the Nordic region saw triple-digit growth compared to June, making it the fastest-growing regional market in Europe.

Compared to North American and Southeast Asian markets, the Nordic market is characterized by “high net worth and low competition.” The chairman noted that one Swedish platform explicitly limits the number of sellers to ensure adequate traffic allocation per seller and avoid price wars. On the PIGU platform, there are fewer than 50 Chinese sellers covering the Baltic market with 13 million active users, which contrasts sharply with the over 2 million Chinese sellers on Amazon in the North American market.

Chinese products entering the Nordic market also face several challenges. Norway has strict requirements on formaldehyde emissions from building materials, while Iceland mandates that food packaging must include instructions in Icelandic. The chairman mentioned that Chinese brands have insufficient recognition in the Nordic region, which limits their pricing power. “In terms of cost-effectiveness, Chinese products are highly recognized, but in the high-end market, brand strength is lacking, with only 22% of consumers able to name more than one Chinese high-end brand.”

The chairman believes that Hubei has excellent conditions for developing cross-border e-commerce with the Nordic countries: Huahu International Airport launched its first full freight route to the Nordic region, “Ezhou-Billund, Denmark,” in 2024, and this year added routes from Ezhou to Copenhagen, Denmark, and Ezhou to Oslo, Norway. Through “air freight + Nordic overseas warehouses,” delivery times can be reduced to 3 days. In terms of rail transport, the China-Europe Railway from Wuhan to Billund has exceeded an annual freight volume of 100,000 tons.

“They have strong purchasing power but high requirements for product quality and service. For Chinese sellers, this is not a burden but an opportunity to improve their capabilities.” The Vice Chairman and Secretary-General of the Ezhou Cross-border E-commerce Association introduced that the Ezhou Cross-border E-commerce Industrial Park, leveraging Huahu International Airport’s logistics network of “overnight delivery nationwide and global connectivity within days,” has attracted 79 enterprises in