(Yicai Global) April 12 -- JD.com is urgently recruiting more couriers in Shanghai as the delivery of food and essential supplies to residents now in their second week of lockdown is delayed due to a lack of deliverymen, the Chinese e-commerce giant said today.

JD.com’s delivery workforce in Shanghai has been reduced to just one third of the usual number, an insider at the company’s logistics arm JD Logistics said. The company is drafting in couriers from around the country to come to Shanghai this week to help out, he added.

Many online orders have been placed ‘on hold’ until more couriers can be found, the Beijing-based company said.

The orders are expected to arrive in Shanghai by April 22, online news outlet The Paper reported today. But just a few days ago, the delivery time was given as only three or four days.

JD.com has more than 100 warehouses in Shanghai and Kunshan in neighboring Jiangsu province, but only a few of them are still operating, the company insider said.

The municipal government is working to unchoke logistics links and resume the trans-regional transportation of materials as soon as possible, Liu Min, deputy director of the city’s commission of commerce, said today. It is urging delivery workers of e-commerce platforms to get back to work.

The city has begun to relax some of its lockdown measures and those residential communities that have had no new cases in the last two weeks can be released from lockdown, according to the latest guidelines. Some supermarkets, restaurants and pharmacies can open for online business so long as they comply with strict epidemic prevention rules.

The number of new cases in the city fell for the first time this month yesterday, with 994 confirmed cases and 22,348 asymptomatic infections, according to the municipal health authority.

Editor: Kim Taylor