Courier Businesses to Recover Faster on E-commerce Boom: Anteraja CEO
Jakarta. Pandemic-induced e-commerce boom will help courier and postal services to recover faster than other logistics companies, according to online delivery service company Anteraja.
Many Indonesians now embrace the option to shop from their desktops or smartphones and have their groceries, clothes, or other items delivered to their doorstep amid the government social activities restrictions. And for courier services, that means more businesses.
"Compared to other logistics sub-sectors, postal, courier and warehousing services are headed for a positive trend, thanks to the presence of door-to-door delivery services and e-commerce," Suyanto Tjoeng, Anteraja's chief executive officer (CEO), said in Investor Daily Summit, a major investment forum that brings together top government officials and business executives from various sectors.
The Ministry of Communication and Information (Kemkominfo) revealed that e-commerce grew 91 percent during the pandemic as internet penetration jumped 74 percent.
Suyanto said, in comparison to the more heavily hit logistics sub-sectors such as aviation which fell 0.28 percent, postal and courier services only fell by 0.1 percent, thanks to e-commerce.
Bank Indonesia, the country's central bank, has projected e-commerce transactions would grow 33 percent to Rp 337 trillion ($23 billion) this year, from Rp 253 trillion last year.
Meanwhile, the logistics sector has significantly recovered since the first virus outbreak. The sector had slumped 30.8 percent in the second quarter of 2020 from the same quarter a year earlier. It showed some recoveries in the subsequent quartets, as the decline narrowed to 16.7 percent in the third quarter and 13.4 percent in the fourth quarter of the year.
The sector contracted by only 0.54 percent in the first quarter of 2021, heading close to its pre-pandemic levels of around 1.3 percent.
Suyanto said there are still more opportunities for growth amid the pandemic, especially in warehousing, postal, and courier sub-sectors.
One reason is recent developments in digital infrastructure. As part of Kemkominfo’s Indonesia Digital Roadmap, 2021-2024, 500,000 Base Transceiver Stations (BTS) have been built across the country for those in the most remote areas to access 4G.
Improvement in Indonesia's overall performance of the logistic system also boosts confidence among courier businesses. Indonesia improved in Logistics Performance Index (LPI) ranking to the 46th from the 75th position between 2010 and 2018. The archipelago now ranks fifth out of eight other Asean countries.
Market research company Mordor Research found that the Indonesian courier, express, and parcel (CEP) market had grown rapidly alongside the country's e-commerce sector since the pandemic. It estimates that the market will double to $6.0 billion in 2026 from $2.9 billion last year.