Chinese social e-commerce upstart Pinduoduo saw a significant uptick in the value of agricultural product orders placed across its platform in 2020, as demand for selling and buying farm produce online rose due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Last year, Nasdaq-listed Pinduoduo generated more than 270 billion yuan ($42 billion) in gross merchandise value (GMV) from agricultural products sold on its platform, nearly double the 2019 figure, according to a company statement released on Tuesday.

The Shanghai-based company partly attributed the robust growth to the pandemic-induced lockdowns which forced farmers to seek online alternatives to traditional wet markets and increased consumer demand for online purchases.

“Agricultural produce is our bread and butter and making groceries affordable and available to our 731 million consumers is our calling,” said Pinduoduo CEO Chen Lei. “We are just at the beginning of the digital revolution in agriculture and are glad that we are making progress every day.”

In February last year when the coronavirus pandemic began spreading rapidly across large parts of China, Pinduoduo launched the “Help the Farmers” channel to connect agricultural producers with consumers in an attempt to minimize losses caused by virus-caused supply chain disruptions. Alibaba and JD.com also took similar action during the pandemic.

Contact reporter Ding Yi (yiding@caixin.com)

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