500 million Yuan vouchers to be disbursed in Wuhan

By Masood Sattar Khan
(Pakistan News & Features Services)

Starting from April 19, the residents of the Chinese city of Wuhan, hit hardest by the novel coronavirus, will get vouchers to help boost their consumption. 

The local administration announced on April 17 that it will hand out vouchers worth 500 million Yuan ($70.6 USD) among all people living in Wuhan. 

Irrespective of local or non-locals, the residents can apply and use the vouchers, a move aimed to support the operation resumption in commercial, trade, cultural and tourism sectors. Around 18 million Yuan of the vouchers will be earmarked for the registered impoverished people in the city.

The municipal government will hand out the vouchers weekly via the online platforms of Alibaba, Meituan Dianping and Tencent. 

The above three E-commerce giants will also offer their own coupons worth a total of 1.8 billion Yuan, which may be used together with the government-issued vouchers. 

The first stage of distribution will be from April 19 to May 31, and the second stage from June 1 to July 31. 

The consumers will be able to use the vouchers for offline payments in restaurants, shopping malls, supermarkets, convenience stores and cultural and tourist sites. At the first stage, they can only use them when their actual expenses reach or exceed three times the voucher value. 

A survey conducted by Alipay showed that over 10 million businesses have benefited from the nationwide voucher campaigns, with over 90 percent of them being micro, small and medium-sized businesses.