Taxi and private-hire car drivers in Singapore can now make grocery and food deliveries to fulfil a growing need this Covid-19 pandemic.

Transport Minister Khaw Boon Wan announced a relaxing of rules in a Facebook post on Sunday, March 29.

"With tighter safe distancing measures, working from home and tele-commuting, demand for home deliveries, whether for food or groceries, has grown," he wrote.

"Anecdotally, it has gotten difficult to obtain a delivery slot across the various online grocery platforms. We are also observing a dip in the fulfilment rates for online food deliveries."

Allowing taxis and private-hire cars to address the shortage of delivery slots is in line with the government's call for people to order food and groceries online instead of venturing out.

Khaw added: "The demand for home delivery will only increase in the upcoming weeks as we push for more people to work from home. Currently, we have a limited trial with Grab to allow its drivers to also deliver goods and food."

Previously, there was a fear that allowing passenger rides to be used for courier and delivery services would lead to jams.

But Khaw noted that this is an unusual time.

Demand for traditional passenger service is down and traffic on the road is smoother as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

There will be a temporary liberalisation of point-to-point regulations, with immediate effect until the end of June, he wrote.

He also wrote: "We have therefore decided to expand the Grab trial and will continue to avail this option to taxi and other PHC (private hire car) operators to allow their drivers to participate in such delivery service, if they wish. This will also help supplement their income."

Khaw's full post:

Meeting Demand and Supplementing Income

With tighter safe distancing measures, working from home and tele-commuting, demand for home deliveries, whether for food or groceries, has grown. Anecdotally, it has gotten difficult to obtain a delivery slot across the various online grocery platforms. We are also observing a dip in the fulfilment rates for online food deliveries. The demand for home delivery will only increase in the upcoming weeks as we push for more people to work from home. Currently, we have a limited trial with Grab to allow its drivers to also deliver goods and food. We were concerned about such service affecting the traditional passenger service, and contributing to traffic jam. But this is an unusual time, with reduced demand for point-to-point transport (P2P) and less traffic on the road.

We have therefore decided to expand the Grab trial and will continue to avail this option to taxi and other PHC operators to allow their drivers to participate in such delivery service, if they wish. This will also help supplement their income. This will be a temporary liberalisation of #P2P regulations, useful, to help our drivers supplement their income (in addition to the help from the government, union, operators, NTA and NPHVA) and to help meet increased demand for home delivery. It takes immediate effect till end of June 2020.