Factors contributing to the regional development of e-commerce in Latvia

Abstract

E-commerce contributes to the improvement of communications between the company, producers, distributors and customers. However, it should be noted that success in e-commerce depends upon determining effective factors in e-commerce. There is a set of effective inside organisational and outside organizational factors in e-commerce which should be taken into consideration during the development of e-commerce. According to the recent results of DESI Index, Latvia lags behind the EU average on integration of digital technology by businesses. Despite excellent connectivity and good digital public services, Latvian SMEs do not use effectively online selling, social media, cloud computing and big data possibilities. At the same time, it is recognised nationally that e-commerce provides good opportunities to develop business, including in the regions. Taking into account the before-mentioned, the aim of the paper is to analyse the factors contribution to the development of e-commerce in the regions in Latvia. Main results of the research: in general, factor groups “Technological development” and “Social factors (human skills)” were assessed the highest among Latvian entrepreneurs. Such individual factors as desire to develop, employee knowledge, and managerial attitude, technological development in the world, and managerial knowledge and existence of financial resources in the company were evaluated the highest in terms of effect on usage of e-commerce in the business. In case of regional cross-cut, in Kurzeme, Riga and Latgale regions entrepreneurs are rather in favour of technological development factors affecting the usage of e-commerce, while entrepreneurs in Zemgale and Vidzeme regions think that social factors affect the development of e-commerce the most.