Around 7.45 million delivery riders earned a total of RMB 80 billion ($11.3 billion) from Meituan last year, company chief executive Wang Xing said in an employee-facing memo on Tuesday, in which Wang listed the social contributions his food delivery giant had made.

Why it matters: Meituan handled 21.9 billion on-demand delivery orders in 2023, according to its annual report, which means its delivery workers made an average of about RMB 3.65 ($0.52) per delivery.

Details: In the internal letter, Wang mentioned that approximately 4.5 million of those 7.45 million riders are covered by national insurance for occupational injury, “We strive to improve the welfare of delivery workers,” he added.

• In China, the sudden death of a 55-year-old delivery rider earlier this month again brought up discussions about the protection of gig economy workers. Local media outlet The Paper reported that the man, surnamed Yuan in police reports, slept around three or four hours nightly, with the rest of his time spent at work. Some users debated whether his death counted as workplace injury.
• Meituan separates riders into two types, zhuansong in Chinese, meaning full-time workers directly hired by the company, and “flexible workers” with largely self-determined working hours. 
• Wang did not provide numbers of each type of Meituan delivery service provider in the email.
• For the company’s international-target operation KeeTa, the CEO revealed its service was No.1 by order volume in Hong Kong. KeeTa recently launched in Saudi Arabia, and Wang said previously that Gulf countries, Europe, and Southeast Asian markets are all under consideration for future expansion.

Context: Beijing-based Meituan’s revenue rose 21% year-on-year to RMB 82 billion in the second quarter this year, while profit for the same period reached RMB 11 billion, up from RMB 4.7 billion in the same period last year.

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