The food delivery volumes in India have reached pre-COVID-19 peaks, Zomato Founder and CEO Deepinder Goyal said on Monday.
He also said it is anticipated that the food delivery sector will continue to grow at around 15-25 per cent month-on-month for the foreseeable future.
"Happy to share that India food delivery volumes have reached pre-COVID peaks. A number of cities are now at over 120 per cent of pre-COVID peaks," Goyal said in a tweet.
In a series of tweets, he added that food delivery is one of the safest recreational options available to the customers during the pandemic.
Goyal said that the key insight this time is that the food delivery sector has recovered to (and even grown beyond) pre-COVID levels in a number of large pockets, led by some of the most affluent locations in India.
Among the larger cities, Goyal said that Delhi and Mumbai are nearing full recovery, while metros such as Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Chennai are still behind the curve.
"Going forward, we anticipate the food delivery sector to continue to grow at around 15-25 per cent m-o-m for the foreseeable future," he added.
"Since March 23rd, 2020, we have delivered a total of 9.2 crore orders – and there have been zero reported cases of COVID transmission through food delivery, or our food delivery agents," Goyal said.
A few weeks ago, WHO also categorically stated that people should not fear food, or food packaging, or processing or delivery of food. People should feel comfortable and safe, he added.
"The last few months have been full of shocks and surprises. We salute the hard work of our delivery partners, along with thousands of our restaurant partners who demonstrated great agility in implementing world class safety practices to ensure that our customers stay safe," Goyal said.
In September, Goyal had said in a blog post that with the ongoing IPL season and the subsequent festive season, "we expect food delivery in both metros and smaller cities to make a full recovery soon – and resume growing over pre-COVID levels.