Delivery services handle 50 billion parcels this year

China's domestic express delivery services have maintained their strong growth momentum, with more than 50 billion parcels handled so far this year－roughly the same as for the whole of 2018.

Figures released by the State Post Bureau on Monday showed the sector had handled 50 billion parcels by Sunday, with 30 percent sent to rural areas in a sign of the growing purchasing power of rural residents.

The number of parcels handled continued to grow in the second quarter of the year, which recorded an average of 10 billion a month.

Annual parcel deliveries topped 50 billion for the first time in 2018, but it took just eight months to reach that number last year and a little over six this year.

The bureau said the surge in parcels is due to stable economic growth, sales promotions by some e-commerce companies, and convenient access to online shopping for rural residents.

It said last month that about 6.6 billion parcels were shipped during the 20-day June 18 online shopping spree, up 24.2 percent year-on-year.

On the busiest day of the spree, which ran from June 1 to June 20, over 400 million parcels were handled.

Zhao Yang, a deliveryman for SF Express in Beijing, said that his daily workload rose to about 150 parcels during the shopping spree.

"I'm now on morning shift at the community, which is not really big, with about 400 households living in it," he said. "I usually handle about 70 to 80 parcels a day from 7 am to 2 pm. But over the shopping festival I averaged 150, double my usual workload."

The bureau said the sector now handles an average of about 300 million parcels a day.