LatAm List – Brazil’s food delivery app iFood experienced nearly double the number of job applications during March following the nation-wide lockdown caused by COVID-19.
Following the lockdown restrictions imposed by the Brazilian government in March, both the number of food orders on the platform and the number of applications for delivery worker positions surged.
“Demand has been quite intense and customer’s behavior is changing across all categories,” commented Diego Barreto, CFO of iFood.
The company received 175,000 applications for the delivery worker position in March – almost twice the 85,000 from February. The company already has 140,000 deliverers running in Brazil, plus 200,000 third-party deliverers who service the restaurants directly.
iFood currently operates in over 1,000 cities across Brazil. With more people unable to work, many are looking to an alternative source of income while the lockdown continues. iFood deliverers receive no fixed salary but earn a portion of the value of each delivery instead. As both delivery services and unemployment levels increase, the food delivery industry is becoming more solicited than ever.
Read more on Reuters.