District of Guiyang addresses food bottlenecks

Volunteers prepare fresh food, including vegetables, fruit and eggs, to deliver to residents in the Huaguoyuan area of Nanming district in Guiyang, Guizhou province, on Thursday. [Photo by converged media center of Nanming district/For chinadaily.com.cn]

An official in Guiyang, Guizhou province, apologized at a news conference on Thursday after many people in a large residential community complained about difficulties in purchasing daily supplies.

"At present, the epidemic situation in the Huaguoyuan area of Nanming district is severe and complex," said Du Min, deputy head of the district. "Because of lack of experience and improper methods, some areas are in short supply of daily supplies. We sincerely apologize for it."

Du said that the district has continued to "improve service and tackle difficulties" since Tuesday.

There are about 220,000 people living in the Huaguoyuan area, Du said, and the district government has launched a system of "online ordering and offline non-contact distribution". More than 600 connection points were set up in the district, including 82 in the Huaguoyuan area.

As of 5 pm on Wednesday, 65,124 orders had been delivered to residents, including about 643,000 kilograms of fresh food — 68,000 kg of meat and 240,000 kg of vegetables.

On Wednesday night, another 32,303 packages were delivered to residents' homes.