WUZHEN, Zhejiang Province, Nov. 23 (Xinhua) -- With the COVID-19 epidemic hitting global economic and social development, the digital economy is viewed as a new engine for global economic recovery, according to a report released by the Chinese Academy of Cyberspace Studies on Monday.

The outbreak of the COVID-19 epidemic has accelerated the digital transformation of the global economy, with the digital economy likely to become a key force that reshapes the economic system and enhances governance capacity, said the World Internet Development Report 2020, which was released during the 2020 World Internet Conference -- Internet Development Forum, held in the water-town of Wuzhen, in east China's Zhejiang Province.

According to the report, the COVID-19 epidemic has stimulated the demand for cloud-terminal coordination and intelligentization, while Internet-related industries face new development opportunities.

The digital economy accounted for between 4.5 and 15.5 percent of the world's GDP in 2019, according to the Digital Economy Report 2019 released by United Nations Conference on Trade and Development.

At the start of 2020, more than 4.5 billion people were using the Internet, with 3.8 billion social-media users and nearly 60 percent of the global population online, according to the Digital 2020 Global Overview Report, citing the World Internet Development Report 2020.