Hypermarket chains generated NT$161.1 billion (US$5.75 billion) in sales in the first eight months of the year, up 3.6 percent year-on-year, as purchases of food and daily necessities increased amid a local COVID-19 outbreak, even though sales derived from their food courts dropped due to a nationwide ban on dine-in services, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said in a report on Friday. Additionally, as hypermarket chains accelerated development of their online shopping platforms this year, riding the post-pandemic trend of offline consumption transitioning to online, they saw Internet sales increase by 49.2 percent year-on-year during the eight-month period. This was higher than