According to news reports, Shanghai is working hard to overcome bottlenecks in logistics and help e-commerce platforms increase production and transport capacity amid strong COVID-19 flare-ups.
The megacity of 25 million people has reported 3,238 confirmed locally transmitted cases and 21,582 local asymptomatic carriers, the numbers are not easing despite strict lockdown measures introduced since late March.
“The epidemic rebound in Shanghai has caused severe pressure on online shopping, bearing in mind that many delivery persons are under closed-off management and some large warehouses have been temporarily closed,” said Liu Min, deputy director of Shanghai Municipal Commission of Commerce.
With lockdown, residents have moved online to make all their daily necessities, however e-commerce sites which depends on delivery workers are faced with daunting task the supply chain is imacted with infected staffs. Good news is that a total of 42 non-epidemic-hit warehouses of Shanghai’s e-commerce platforms had resumed operations, with more than 18,000 delivery drivers completing about 1.8 million orders per day.
China is stuck between a rock and hard place at this moment, its Zero policy tolerance is no longer in full force, the officials have laxed the procedures and easing some of the restrictions.
Testing continue to be the marker for progress, Shanghai adopts a “2+2” testing mode for logistics workers, requiring them to take two antigen tests every other day, one antigen test and one nucleic acid test the following day.
