Delivery ‘apps’ grow due to unemployment

Ecuadornews:

Glovo Company celebrates one year in Ecuador and adds about 1,000 delivery drivers. In Quito and Cuenca 50% are Venezuelans.

The labor situation in the country has been one of the factors for the expansion of delivery platforms such as Uber Eats or Glovo, which yesterday completed one year of operations in Ecuador.

At that time, Glovo already has about 1,000 distributors in Quito, Guayaquil and Cuenca, said Daniel Arévalo, general manager of Glovo in Ecuador. “This industry flies,” he adds.

People who do not have a job have opted for options such as Glovo and this, according Arévalo, boosts the country’s labor market.

Another ingredient adds to the growth of distributors of applications in the country: Venezuelan migration. According to Glovo, in Quito and Cuenca 50% of the distributors are of that nationality. While in Guayaquil the figure reaches 15%.

In October of last year, Uber Eats said that in Ecuador it had 1,000 delivery people and 400 restaurants.

EXPRESO learned that the Colombian application Rappi, which also specializes in deliveries, prepares the land to land in Ecuador. Currently, the application is now available to be downloaded in the country’s telephones, but for now it only works in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, Peru and Uruguay.

However, the platforms continue to be questioned from various sectors that demand better benefits and safety for workers.

According to a report by the Economic Commission for Latin America (ECLAC) and the International Labor Organization (ILO), digital platforms, contrary to improving the conditions of workers in Latin America, participate as intermediaries and remain the majority of the profit, paying for underemployment and informality.

“Technological innovations (…) have led to the emergence of a work agreement that has been called” digital daily work “. It shares many of the characteristics of the work of traditional day laborers, but the enganchador has been replaced by digital platforms that connect supply and demand, “warns the report The Future of Work in Latin America and the Caribbean.

According to the latest employment statistics of the National Institute of Statistics and Census (INEC), the rate of adequate or full employment fell by 3.2 percentage points compared to March 2018. This means that in the last year a total of 261,767 people lost their job. full or adequate employment. Last year, the former Minister of Labor, Raúl Ledesma, said that legislation was being studied to regularize work in applications, but so far it has only been an announcement. (I)

Source: https://www.expreso.ec/economia/apps-entrega-crecen-desempleo-GL2904866