China's catering industry nearly back to pre-COVID-19 level

China's catering industry has recovered to 70-80 percent of pre-COVID-19 level in the first half of this year, Sina Finance reported on Monday.

The revenue of the industry reached 1.46 trillion yuan ($210 billion) with decrease narrowing and gradual recovering trend in the first six months, according to a report on resumption of work in the catering sector.

Although recovering gradually, China's catering industry still faces challenges including policy constraints, rent affects, high commissions and shortage of funds, said the report released by China Cuisine Association.

The association proposed to expand the coverage of the reduction and exemption policy, implement superimposed value-added tax reduction and exemption policy, and provide special credit support to catering companies.

Meanwhile, it is also recommended to provide a certain percentage of financial subsidies to the tenants, and directly reduce the rent burden of catering companies through direct rent subsidies.

In addition it is suggested to reduce the commission rate of the delivery platform and separate the delivery fee from the commission fee and encourage companies to adopt flexible employment methods.

Furthermore, the development of private companies in catering industry should be vigorously encouraged and measures to boost consumption confidence and support catering industry development should be introduced.

Getting over the challenges of the pandemic, China's catering industry will be more organized and its structure will be more reasonable, said Jiang Junxian, president of the China Culinary Association.

The whole industry is more deeply aware the importance of close combination with the capital market, learn to use the power of capital to strengthen their own, improve the ability to resist risks, Jiang said.