China’s sharing economy demonstrated remarkable resilience and potential in 2021 amid the Covid-19 pandemic headwinds, with a turnover reaching CNY3.69 trillion, up 9.2% on a yearly basis, according to a report from the State Information Center (SIC). The scale of direct financing for the sharing economy stood at CNY213.7 billion in 2021, an increase of 80.3% year-on-year, the report said. The sharing economy in the fields of office space, knowledge skills and life services witnessed rapid growth, with transaction volumes growing 26.2%, 13.2% and 5.8% year-on-year, respectively. The report also said the market size of the shared accommodation sector declined by 3.8% in 2021, compared with the same period a year earlier due to the pandemic and the adjustment of supervisory policies in some cities.
Although many short-term vacation rental platforms have adjusted their operating strategies and shifted their focus to rural homestays, the nation’s shared accommodation segment is still facing huge pressure and uncertainty as pent-up demand for travel has not been fully unleashed and the new business model is not mature, the SIC said. The report noted that sharing services and consumption play a vital role in stabilizing economic growth. For instance, revenue from online food delivery platforms accounted for about 21.4% of revenue in the country’s catering industry last year, up 4.5 percentage points from 2020. Per capita spending on food delivery platforms took up some 21.4% of the overall catering expenditure in 2021, up 4.4 percentage points year-on-year, while per capita expenditure on ride-hailing services made up 8.3% of travel consumption.
Food delivery platform Ele.me said 1.14 million delivery workers at the platform achieved stable incomes last year, with 1,877 of them being promoted to station and team leaders. A total of 10,203 delivery staff received vocational training from the platform last year, it said. Zhou Guangsu, Associate Professor with the School of Labor and Human Resources at Renmin University of China in Beijing, said the platform-based economy has not only stimulated the growth of consumption, but also promoted its upgrade, which has injected more vitality into the economy and boosted employment, the China Daily reports.
