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Express delivery helps flow of goods rebound
Last Updated: 2020-05-12 09:27 | China Daily Global
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The flow of delivered goods, once interrupted by the COVID-19 outbreak, has notably recovered in Beijing.

More people can receive goods at their doorstep or downstairs, since Beijing said at the end of April that express delivery workers can enter residential communities with green-code registration-a verification system for entering and leaving residential areas or densely populated public places.

"The goods ordered by our clients have further diversified from packed rice, vegetables, toilet paper, edible oil, snacks and ethanol for disinfection during the February-March period, to sun cream, summer clothing, books, electronics, fresh fruit and wine in April," said Li Jie, a 27-year-old delivery worker at a Beijing service depot of logistics company ZTO Express.

To prevent infection, the company has given Li and his colleagues sufficient protective supplies such as masks and gloves. It has also required them during the outbreak to sterilize their electric vehicles and goods-distribution areas within or outside residential communities at least three times a day.

In contrast to export-oriented companies that have been hit hard by declining global demand during the first quarter of the year, the rise of e-commerce-based platforms, express delivery, takeaway and related industries has become a symbol of China's highly mobilized, dynamic economic forms amid the COVID-19 outbreak, said Liao Tao, general manager of China Post Group's delivery branch.

Couriers and takeaway riders these days are often called the "capillaries" of the city, he said, adding that these industries have been helpful in creating jobs during the tough period.

By supporting people's daily lives and helping businesses resume operations over the past three months, Wang Xingting, a delivery rider at an SF Express service depot in Beijing's Haidian district, said his depot's workload surged since the Spring Festival period. He said a number of former fitness instructors and employees of nightclubs and restaurants have joined his company due to the temporary shutdown of their work sites after the Spring Festival holiday.

Thanks to the country's continuous effort to effectively contain the spread of the virus, China's average daily express shipment volume had exceeded 200 million pieces in late April, returning to the normal operational level before the COVID-19 outbreak, according to data released by the State Post Bureau.

Online retail sales of physical goods currently account for one-fifth of the total retail sales of the country's consumer goods, said Bian Zuodong, deputy director-general of the bureau's department of market supervision.

He said the government, which is eager to upgrade the sector's earning strength, will encourage e-commerce and logistics service providers to expand three sectors-rural, manufacturing and international markets-to further stimulate domestic consumption and facilitate the resumption of production and exports.

A ZTO Express worker processes packages at a delivery station in Wuhan, Hubei province. [Photo by Zhu Xingxin/China Daily]

Express delivery businesses in Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province and the city once hit hardest in China by COVID-19, reached the target of restoring 90 percent of production in mid-April. The city has 4,468 express delivery outlets, and 4,288 of them had reopened by the end of last month, accounting for 95.97 percent of the total, the local government reported in late April.

The extended Lunar New Year holiday and the self-quarantine during the coronavirus outbreak's peak in China highlighted the express delivery industry's significance in distributing daily living and medical materials, as well as goods such as food, laundry detergent and facemasks, to Chinese families across the country, said Yu Weijiao, chairman of Shanghai-based YTO Express.

"The epidemic will change many Chinese consumers' shopping behavior in the long run," he said, emphasizing that China's battle against the virus has accelerated the shift toward online commercial channels and new retail based on on-demand delivery.

In addition to investing 1 billion yuan ($141 million) to build an industrial zone to develop the next generation of logistic tools and solutions, as well as other commercial projects in Shanghai this year, YTO Express has not only deployed resources to help Chinese companies resume production, but has also sent cargo planes to ship epidemic prevention and control materials and goods to countries including Malaysia, the Philippines and Pakistan.

The express sector will shift from a labor-intensive sector to a capitaland technology-intensive one, said Cai Jin, vice-president of the Beijing-based China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing. This is in line with the government's desire to support the development by express delivery and technology companies of smart postal lockers, drones, driverless vehicles and fully automated warehouses to boost the express industry's work efficiency and upgrade its digital technologies, he said.

"Key players have already begun to cut operational costs and improve efficiency via adding investment in the areas including service robots, 5G application, drones, big data, electric trucks, new cargo aircraft and internet-connected warehouse facilities," Cai said.

China's express delivery market has been the world's largest by volume since 2014 and is likely to become the largest by revenue in 2020, global credit ratings agency Fitch Ratings predicted in a report in March. This will be underpinned by the country's shift to a consumption-driven economy, continuing urbanization, rising e-tailing penetration into inland and lower-tier regions and the rise of new retail models and social e-tailing, it said.

Apart from dealing with the coronavirus outbreak, the agency affirmed that industry concentration will keep rising as larger companies that have a competitive edge gain market share as well as through mergers and acquisitions, strategic alliances and the exit of smaller participants throughout China.

Since express delivery is an essential industry for the national economy, its strategic value, driven by strong market demand, will not face a substantial impact this year, said Lai Meisong, chairman of Shanghai-based ZTO Express.

China's courier sector saw rapid growth during the recent five-day May Day holiday, with parcels collected and delivered both surpassing 1 billion pieces, according to data from the State Post Bureau.

In all, 1.1 billion parcels were collected during the period, up 41.8 percent year-on-year, while 1.04 billion parcels were delivered, up 38.93 percent from a year earlier.

The bureau said China's express delivery business rebounded from a low level in January, with positive growth in February. Growth remains at over 30 percent on a yearly basis, it said.

(Editor:Fu Bo)

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Express delivery helps flow of goods rebound
Source:China Daily Global | 2020-05-12 09:27
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