In August, for the first time in a decade, car-hailing services Uber and Lyft acknowledged their contribution to the worsening traffic condition in US cities.

Market day At the Mega Market in Pasig City, commerce begins very early in the morning and well into the night throughout the year. AL Padilla @tribunephl_al

By the end of 2019, the Philippines’ Internet economy is expected to hit $7B-worth of gross merchandise value (GMV) according to the latest e-Conomy SEA research of Google and Singapore’s think tank, Temasek.

That’s at least 2 percent of the country’s local output measured as the gross domestic product (GDP), rather small compared to say, Vietnam, whose Internet economy already makes up 5 percent of the country’s economy. Still, the number speaks volumes about the impact that the growing crop of Internet companies has made in the Philippine market.

Today, Filipinos aren’t only shopping for clothes online, they expect their groceries and office lunches to be delivered right to their homes and cubicles too. And thanks to the ubiquity of ride-hailing services, many no longer worry about staying out late as they can surely book a ride home.

E-commerce and ride-hailing services have become some of the biggest contributors to the Internet economy boom in the country. In the past four years, the GMV of both industries have enjoyed an annualized growth of 47 and 35 percent respectively.

In the midst of this growth, though, came a number of repercussions.

There are no formal studies for the Philippines yet, but across the region and even in cities outside Southeast Asia where both e-commerce and ride-hailing services are widely available, traffic conditions have worsened through time.

In August, for the first time in a decade, car-hailing services Uber and Lyft acknowledged their contribution to the worsening traffic condition in US cities.

It’s a landmark admission for the industry that used to pride itself in taking people out of their private cars and have them in a single vehicle on their way to their different destinations with the aim of making transport both cheaper and more efficient in cities.

As they scrambled to acquire more customers, e-commerce sites too have promised faster deliveries of goods ordered, even if that meant sending their fleet of trucks or motorcycles half-empty. A McKinsey report has revealed that commercial trucks now contribute 40 percent of vehicle congestion in American urban cities.

These factors, coupled with the crippling transportation system and infrastructure in cities worldwide, but more especially in Metro Manila, have resulted in a perfect storm — a traffic crisis.

And like most wide-scale disaster scenes, the solution will require a massive effort from everybody, including me, as a commuter, a shopper and CEO of a same-day delivery logistics platform.

It’s been shared multiple times by analysts that private cars are the biggest contributors to traffic in Metro Manila. Some say they would not be taking their cars to work if only there’s an available mass transport option that is decent, reliable and safe. The government says it’s doing its part in alleviating the problem as they build more highways and upgrade existing train lines.

But as the rest of the country waits, any commuter may pitch in even small efforts to help traffic flow more smoothly. Those who live near their workplaces may consider taking bikes, electric scooters or even walking. Those who have workmates near their homes may consider carpooling. If you’re on the road, be a considerate and smart driver by following traffic rules. It sounds simple, but one might be surprised how the multiplication of those small efforts can impact traffic conditions.

As a shopper, it sure is tempting to order goods on impulse, even every day from different online stores at a time. But one may consider practicing the equivalent of what people used to do before the e-commerce era: run that shopping errand once a week. It’s still the practice of discipline that can help a great deal: check out that shopping box once in a week or once a month, and avoid ordering various items at different time periods. Consider opting for the regular delivery time, too. This way, your orders are consolidated in a bigger delivery deployment, ensuring that the truck set to bring your items to your doorstep is optimized, which reduces the number of delivery vehicles on the road.

That last bit is one factor I’ve been trying to develop as the CEO of Mober. See, we were the first on-demand delivery service in the Philippines. Since we launched the startup in 2016, we have sought to help alleviate the traffic problem (or not to add to it) by tapping underutilized delivery trucks on the road. Now, we’re aiming to make our service an even smarter logistics solution.

It’s a them, I have been discussing lately, going back to the basics of the sharing economy, in terms of matching available assets and another’s need for it, and the systems and technology that facilitate them most efficiently.

Thus, we have upgraded our enterprise as we allow merchants located near each other, like brick-and-mortar stores in malls, to consolidate purchased items set for same-day delivery in a single deployment.

This way, our Mober trucks are filled with items by the time they hit the road, maximizing their capacity to deliver goods as quickly as possible.

It’s not only time-efficient for our drivers, but it’s cost-efficient for merchants, too.