Chalermchai, who is currently in China, was speaking during a visit to Hema, an air-conditioned supermarket with full digital systems that combines online and offline shopping,

This supermarket is a small distribution that delivers fresh food to Chinese consumers who place an order on the Tmall website in radius of three kilometres of the store within half an hour. The whole process can be done through all of Alibaba’s digital platforms.

Hema has many features such as Cashless Supermarket system where consumers can pay via Taobao or Alipay smartphone app, as well as a face recognition payment system.

In addition, every product has QR code which allows consumers to see details such as production date, expiry date, and product origin, including how to cook and how to store the product.

Chalermchai said that Thai products are very popular among consumers, especially aromatic coconut and Thai rice.

“Currently, China allows Thailand to bring in 22 kind of fruits. Fruits that very popular are durian, mangosteen, coconut, and longan,” he said.

“China has imported more than 100 per cent from the previous year, with over 430,000 tonnes of durian, 160,000 tonnes of coconuts, and 150,000 tonnes of mangosteen totaling more than US$1.6 billion.”