In India, Flipkart tops the ‘fairness’ quotient for gig economy workers: Report

• In India, Flipkart’s delivery & logistics arm eKart ranks first in terms of ‘fairness’ for its gig economy workers.
  
• Foodpanda, Uber and Ola scored only two points, fulfilling only minimum wages criteria for its workforce.
  
• Separately, to ease the delivery process, the platform also introduced robots to sort packages according to pincodes.

The Oxford Internet Institute has just rolled out its first report rating gig economy platforms in India in terms of their working conditions — minimum wages, health and safety at work.

With a number of Indians entering the gig economy, which includes workforce that is remotely managed by online platforms such as Flipkart, Uber among others, workplace conditions have become an important consideration.

Walmart owned e-commerce platform Flipkart topped the company rankings in India for its delivery and logistics arm eKart scoring seven points.

While food delivery platform Foodpanda, cab services platform Ola and Uber scored just two points, fulfilling only the criteria for minimum wages. However, Uber’s food delivery platform UberEats scored three points, adding the facility of offering a process for the decisions that affect workers.

The report measured the markets on five fronts — fair pay, fair working conditions, fair contracts, that is transparency around the terms & conditions, fair management, and fair representation.

The ranking has been concluded on the basis of a collaborated ‘Fairwork Research Project’ by the International Institute of Information Technology Bangalore, the University of Cape Town, the University of Manchester, and the University of the Western Cape analysing the markets in India and South Africa.

Separately, Flipkart has also recently introduced robots — Automated Guided Vehicles (AGV) — in its delivery process to sort packages as per the pin codes where it is to be delivered. However, the company reportedly said that the move will not impact its workforce as it will ‘upskill’ its employees for larger work.

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