Scheme defraying food delivery costs extended till July 15 amid Covid-19 curbs
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ENTERPRISE Singapore's (ESG) Food Delivery Booster Package, which partly defrays delivery costs for food and beverage (F&B) businesses, is being extended by a month till July 15, ESG said on Sunday.
The package defrays delivery costs via food delivery platforms and third-party logistics partners, and was re-introduced last month, originally to cover transactions from May 16 to June 15.
It is being extended to support F&B businesses as Singapore transitions to Phase 3 (Heightened Alert), "and encourage them to continue with food delivery sales in the longer run", said ESG.
Noting that dine-in restrictions in recent weeks have been challenging for the sector, Minister of State for Trade and Industry Low Yen Ling said this extension "seeks to alleviate the painful effects of disruption and offer a longer runway of support even after dine-in services resume".
From Monday, some Covid-19 measures will be loosened, with social gatherings of up to five persons allowed. But dining-in will not be allowed until June 21 at the earliest, assuming the pandemic situation remains under control.
Seven new partners have also joined the scheme - food delivery platform Bungkus, and third-party logistics players Chope, GrabExpress, pandago, DLVRD, Milkrun and YY Circle - bringing the total number of partners to 13.
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Under the package, ESG funds five percentage points of the commission cost charged by food delivery platforms, and 20 per cent of the delivery costs for food delivery via third-party logistics partners.
Since it was re-introduced last month, the Food Delivery Booster Package has benefited more than 10,000 F&B establishments.
Based on preliminary estimates from the first two weeks of Phase 2 (Heightened Alert), from May 16 to 29, the daily average number of online food deliveries supported by the package was almost 20 per cent higher than the daily average during last year's "circuit breaker", said ESG.
Food delivery demand has grown in general. The percentage of sales that the F&B sector derives from online food delivery has risen, from an average of 12.5 per cent in January till March 2020, to 22.5 per cent in the same period this year.
READ MORE: F&B and retail companies to get help to offset delivery costs, go digital: Enterprise Singapore
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