The Ministry of Commerce has combined efforts with restaurants and five delivery platforms to reduce daily living costs for the public by cutting the GP rates charged to eateries to 25 percent.
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Commerce Jurin Laksanawisit, met with the food delivery platforms and representatives of the restaurant industry including the Restaurant Entrepreneurship Association and Thai Restaurant Association as well as six financial institutions, to agree on two activities to support COVID-19 hit restaurants. The first is the Lot 11 project aimed at helping both restaurants and domestic users of food delivery services.
The platforms agreed to reduce their Gross Profit (GP) charge on restaurants from the usual 25-35 percent to 25 percent throughout the month of June in Bangkok, while food prices will be cut elsewhere in the country. Participating platforms include Robinhood, Food Panda, Grab, Gojek and Lineman. The activity will see menu items discounted by up to 60 percent.
The ministry is also to facilitate matching between eateries and loan providing banks this June 7-20. The move will see soft loans without the need for collateral, made available to restaurants.
Over 110,000 outlets registered with the Department of Business Development are eligible for the loans. Of the total, 15,000 are juristic entities while over 100,000 are individual owners. While the two schemes will result in a loss of 250-350 million baht for food delivery platforms, the discount activity is expected to stimulate the economy by no less than 2 billion baht. (NNT)