Three leading Chinese food delivery platforms – Alibaba-backed Ele.me, Meituan Waimai, the food delivery arm of group-buying site Meituan, and Baidu Waimai – were ordered to delist 60 unlicensed restaurants, the Beijing Food and Drug Administration (FDA) told news outlet The Beijing News on Wednesday.
Good-looking food from shabby restaurants
Restaurants on food delivery platform Baidu Waimai were accused of using out-of-date vegetables, lack of employee health and hygiene inspection, and unsanitary restaurants conditions, despite the food looking good and tasty when being handed to customers, The Beijing News reported on Tuesday. What’s worse, these restaurants had not obtained a proper operation license in the first place.
From Guangdong to Beijing
The food safety issue concerning restaurants on these three food delivery platforms is more than just coincidence. AllChinaTech reported in May that the Guangdong FDA in South China ordered the three platforms to reform, after they were found delivering unsanitary food from unlicensed restaurants to customers.
Rampant unsanitary restaurants on food delivery platforms
According to a report released by research institute Analysys in January 2016, China’s food delivery market in 2015 was dominated by the three platforms. Ele.me came first with a market share of 33.7%. Meituan Waimai and Baidu Waimai followed with a market share of 33.1% and 19%, respectively.
Unlicensed restaurants on food delivery platforms are rampant. Monthly sales volume at 16 unlicensed restaurants in Beijing at Baidu Waimai was more than RMB 3.5 million (USD 527,000), The Beijing News reported.
(Top photo from Baidu Images)