Platform economies, food delivery workers, and urban consumption behavior.
Meituan, a major generator of food-delivery plastic waste, has begun funding environmental organisations working on plastic reduction. Spanning fundraising ethics to corporate PR tactics, Shan Shui Conservation Center co-founder Sun Shan and freelance environmental writer Ma Tianjie ask whether public-interest organisations can hold their independence against polluter funding.
In 2024, riders’ sudden deaths, the exposé of “ghost takeaway”, collective protests, two new books and two films pushed the plight of workers under delivery-platform algorithms into public discourse. Foodthink reviews the year’s key stories and films about platforms and food.
From the labour order of delivery riders to the insights into symbiosis offered by mycelial networks, more than ten new books published in 2024 across food, agriculture and ecology record the hope intertwined with contradictions between people, land and nature.
CoopCycle brings together 67 cycle-delivery cooperatives from around the world, where riders are paid hourly and enjoy paid leave, with no algorithmic monitoring or dynamic pricing, operating on the democratic principle of “one person, one vote”.
From a short film about delivery riders to a Parliamentary vote, Singapore used its unique system of tripartism over three years to close the institutional gap for more than 70,000 platform workers, securing protections in CPF, Work Injury Compensation and collective bargaining.
Director Liu Taifeng of Another Day Full of Hope says riders’ “zero-cost onboarding” is really just debt for equipment and rent upfront; engineers under KPIs dare not question the system; restaurant owners must pad reviews — all strata are bound by the same algorithmic logic.
Foodthink chats with director Liu Taifeng and producer Zhu Tong about their in-depth research into delivery riders before filming, and about riders and programmers being equally trapped in the system – and how to find our footing when faced with platforms.
Apollo Go in Wuhan leaves drivers with nothing but remote fire-fighting; Bianlifeng locks store managers’ experience outside the algorithm; Meituan’s system turns the time riders save by running red lights into new standards — power is accelerating toward the platforms.
Going Against the Flow has its programmer protagonist fall to become a delivery rider, yet ends with his return to a major internet company; it reduces algorithmic oppression of labour to a technical fix and sidesteps the collective struggle actually taking place among riders.
During the summer of 2021, Yuyang spent four months as an Ele.me dedicated rider in Zhongguancun, navigating between the delivery station, merchants and customers, contending with order dispatch, complaints and attendance tracking – making a decision almost every minute and second.
