Amazon India is set to complete the hiring of 50,000 seasonal workers this week, and says it is operating at a higher capacity compared to the pre-COVID period, nearly at the Diwali peak levels.

The e-commerce sector had seen massive challenges during the lockdown, and companies were only allowed to sell essential services during the first two phases.

However, since the gradual reopening of zones, e-commerce is seeing a huge surge in demand, especially for non-essential items.

On hiring

Amazon had announced on May 22 that it was creating 50,000 seasonal roles in its warehouse and delivery network

Akhil Saxena, VP, Customer Fulfilment Operations, APAC, MENA & LATAM, Amazon, told CNBC TV-18 that the hiring process is nearly completed.

"We are seeing significantly high demand and we know we needed resources. By the end of this week or early next week, we should have completed our hiring for 50,000 seasonal workers," he said.

"We worked with multiple partners, staffing agencies for hiring. This hiring is across the country and across first-mile, middle-mile and last mile,” Saxena said.

In the US, Amazon hired 1.75 lakh workers on a seasonal basis during the pandemic, but the company recently said that it will make 70 percent of these roles permanent.

Saxena said that Amazon India is looking at meeting demand.

“It is a question of demand and capacity. We know demand in groceries and consumables will continue for a long period,” he said.

On increasing capacity

Amazon is now operating at almost a similar capacity as during the Diwali peak, Saxena said.

"We are operating at much higher capacities than pre-COVID days. We are building capacity in areas such as groceries and consumables,” Saxena said.

“We expanded pin codes where we deliver pantry shipments by 3X in just a few weeks,” he added.

Amazon has over 50 fulfillment centres in India, with a total storage capacity – more than 26 million cubic feet.

Currently, one of the challenges for Amazon in India was the limited domestic flights for inter-city shipments.

“Air capacity is still a challenge. So based on inventory and customer, where inventory may be in one city and the customer in another, the promises are a bit adjusted,” he said.

On food delivery

Amazon also recently launched its foray in food delivery, starting with Bengaluru.

Amazon launched Amazon Food in a few pin codes in Bengaluru on May 21.

“We only have handpicked local restaurants on the platform currently. We are doing exhaustive checks on restaurant hygiene,” Saxena said.

“It is too early to talk about demand off-take on food delivery or on the expansion of food delivery to more cities,” he added.