While continuing to fight the ongoing novel coronavirus epidemic, China’s courier sector had gone back to 80 percent of its normal delivery capacity by Feb. 28, according to the State Post Bureau.

(Photo/Xinhua)

The bureau said 2.5 million deliverymen have resumed work, accounting for 90.2 percent of the total.

Data from the bureau showed that 162 million parcels have been collected by deliverymen, while 160 million were delivered, accounting for 81 percent and 80 percent of the sector’s normal capacity, respectively.

The sector has gone beyond its target of recovering over 60 percent of its normal delivery capacity by the end of February.

The sector’s quick recovery can be attributed to the positive trend in controlling the epidemic and China’s measures to get people and businesses back to work, said Yang Daqing, a researcher with the China Society of Logistics.

Yang added that platforms such as China’s e-commerce giant Alibaba have also rolled out positive measures lowering costs for courier firms. Alibaba’s e-commerce platform Tmall and logistics arm Cainiao Network have set up a 1 billion yuan fund to subsidize supply chains and logistics.

Meanwhile, “non-contact delivery” is being encouraged to reduce the risk of infection, with deliverymen putting orders in self-collection containers or pre-determined locations.

Chinese courier giant SF Holding posted a 10.6 percent year-on-year increase in revenues, totalling 11.2 billion yuan, from its express delivery business in January.