34th PAPU Administrative Council PAPU/AC/PSC/2015 - Doc N°03

24 May-03 June 2015, Khartoum, Sudan

POSTAL STRATEGY COMMITTEE

  1. Subject
  • Report of the African postal strategy conference (Bern, 10 April, 2015)
/ References/Paragraphs
Previous decisions of the Administrative Council and the Postal Strategy Committee report (Malawi 2014) / Observations
  1. Decisions Expected
The Committee is invited to:
  • Note the report
  • Review the outcomes, notably the successand challenges in the implementation of the Doha Postal Strategy
  • ConsiderAfrica’s priorities for the next world postal strategy (Istanbul)
  • Make appropriate recommendations to the Council, including the attached resolution.

I Background

Following the decision of the UPU to relocate the midterm strategy conference from Grand Bassam, Côte d'ivoire, to Geneva, the General Secretariat requested the International Bureau of the UPU to make their conference facilities available to PAPU free of charge. The UPU Director General kindly agreed and expressed satisfaction with the idea of a forum for Africa to harmonize positions and develop inputs into the Geneva conference.

The African strategy conferencewas then successfully hosted at the International Bureau of the Universal Postal Union (UPU) on 10th April, 2015 and attended by 21 member states, two sub-regional organizations and IFAD (International Fund for Agricultural Development). Nearly 100 delegates participated. They included the chairman, moderators, presenters, panellists, and the consultant who was engaged by PAPU to study and assess the level of implementation of DPS, as well as IFAD representative and several IB staff.

The conference concept was summarized as progress and lessons learned from the implementation of the Doha Postal Strategy to-date and challenges for the future in the framework of Vision 2020; “How African posts can proactively develop innovative, integrated and all inclusive solutions for customers and stakeholders.”

II Official opening ceremony

The conference was officially opened by Prof. John Nkoma, chairman of PAPU Administrative Council in the presence of Ambassador Bishar Hussein, UPU Director General, Mr. Younouss Djibrine, PAPU Secretary General, and Mr. Kolawole Aduloju, PAPU Assistant Secretary General.

Both the chairman and the UPU Director Generalexpressed satisfaction with the General Secretariat’s initiative to organize the conference in Bern and the impressive turnout. They urged participants to focus on the theme of the conference and ensure Africa’s harmonized position and inputs into the UPU mid-term strategy conference which opened later in Geneva on 13-14 April, 2015. The Secretary General joined the chairman in thanking the DG of UPU for availing critical hosting facilities to PAPU free of charge. (More details on presentations and speeches are available on ).

III Sessions

The one day conference was characterised by enlightening presentations and lively debate,starting with the first session which commenced with the presentation of the consultant’s report. This was followed by panel discussions which mainly focused on exchange of ideas and sharing of experiences with designated panellists from Uganda, Cameroon, Egypt and Nigeria. Zimbabwe moderated the session which also attracted lively interventions from the floor.

There were two sessions in the afternoon starting with one moderated by Gabon on the theme: “African posts strategically positioning themselves to proactively develop innovative, integrated and all inclusive solutions for customers and stakeholders”. Panellists were drawn from Senegal (on the topic: “Legal framework to face the challenges of the future”), Côte d'Ivoire (on the topic: “Innovative services to meet customers’ expectations”), Tunisia (on the topic: “New technological innovations for the post of the future”) and IFAD which shared the organization’s initiatives, experiences and policies to promote inclusion.

The second session addressed the theme:“Postal financial services, financial inclusion and strengthening of partnerships and cooperation between stakeholders across borders.”

Malawi moderated the session whose panellists were drawn from Kenya (on the topic: “Financial inclusion: An offer for a strong growing postal sector”), Benin (on the topic: “Expanding the scope of activities to continental and intercontinental levels”) and SAPOA represented by Zimbabwe, (on the topic: Collaborative approach to development cooperation”).

The conference chairman presented a summary of the proceedings before closing the meeting at 18.40 hrs.

IV Consultant’s report

The consultant, Mr. Claude Defoundoux, focused his presentation on the theme: “Mid-term assessment of the implementation of the Doha Postal Strategy, assessment and way forward”.

Highlights of his presentation:

Based on UPU statistics and responses to a questionnaire prepared by the consultant during the study the report revealed as follows:

Operational challenges:

The postal sector is characterized by:

  • Low mail volumes;
  • Poor quality of service level;
  • Users have little trust in postal services;
  • National operators are more often underperforming;
  • The postal staff process 10 times less mail than those in Industrialized Countries;
  • The sector is in reality very competitive even though in most cases, the law gives the postal sector a quasi monopoly status
  • The financial situation of the national operator is catastrophic: more than 3/4 of African Posts have negative net operating results (UPU statistics);

Implementation of DPS:

He presented the status of achievement of the Doha Postal Strategy based on the same UPU and member countries’ data.

Quality of service (mail):

  • Twenty nine (29) PAPU member states are participating in the UPU continuous testing;
  • A slight improvement of QS was observed in 2014: with an average of 39.1% of mail distributed within the J+5;
  • Low investments in equipments and staff, as well as an inappropriate organization of the supply chain is a great handicap to mail QS

Modernization of products:

  • ICTs have significantly changed social and business communications and led to a serious decline of traditional mail;
  • Modernization and diversification of postal products and services depend on availability of electricity and Internet connection;
  • New services focus on e-post and financial services;
  • Parcel traffic is not yet benefiting from Internet, intelligent tracking technologies and electronic distribution notifications.

Market conditions

MAILS

On market growth,the consultant indicated that:

  • There is little correlation between economic development and postal traffic;
  • The drop in international mail volume is continuous, and Africa’s performance is the poorest
  • Structural constraints, like forcing addressees to collect their mail at the post office and pay for the service, have been an obstacle to the development of postal volumes;
  • Parcel service faces even more daunting challenges
  • procedures relating to customs and storage at points of entry are cumbersome;
  • Efforts made in electronic postal payment services, via IFS of UPU, led to the increase of the traffic of postal money orders;
  • Posts have invested in new technologies and are now involved in the person-to-person transfer market, namely via mobile;
  • Some countries are involved in a transformation process of financial services, with the arrival of postal banks

Postal Regulation

  • The universal postal service has been defined in almost all countries;
  • The general trend is the liberalization of the postal market.
  • Several countries have multi-sector regulatory authorities as support to market opening process
  • Regulators’ missions generally seek to ensure adherence to healthy and fair
  • competition, coordinate the implementation of the development policy for universal service/access, and compliance to regulations

The study established PAPU’s ability to meet changing market needs, through initiatives such as some projects developed with the UPU on Quality of service, market growth, financial services, sustainable development and postal reform.There are also good prospects for better performance by the sector following the introduction of a major project with the financial support of the UAE as well as the project on development of the postal infrastructure (electrification, connectivity).

The consultant concluded his presentation by highlighting the priorities of the postal sector for the 2017-2020 Period as follows:

  • Postal reform
  • Quality of service improvement
  • Densification and modernization of the postal infrastructure
  • Development of e-commerce
  • Increased use of new technologies to offer quality postal services
  • Strengthen postal services security to ensure postal integrity and facilitate customs process for postal items
  • Accelerate the implementation of postal addressing and post codes.

V Presentations, debate and executive summary by the chair

Key issues

  • Postal reform is anecessary process towards the transformation of the sector to ensure its relevance in a rapidly changing business, financial and technological environment, as well as customer expectations. It was emphasized that sectoral reforms seek to guarantee universal postal service provision, particularly in developing countries;
  • Development of a sectoral policy and preparation of appropriate legal framework ensure sustainability of reforms and modernization of the postal network;
  • The sector should strategically position itself in order to proactively develop innovative, integrated and inclusive solutions for customers and stakeholders;
  • Focus on service standards, new technologies, innovations and diversification of products and services are key success factors for post offices of the 21st century;
  • The 3D postal network gives the sector a distinctive advantage in potential business growth areas, notably e-commerce and financial inclusion programmes;
  • There were positive indications that some good progress was being made by member states on various fronts including quality of service improvement, as well as financial services that have been identified as a key growth area for the sector;
  • More work (lobbying) needs to be done to bring Governments and key public institutions on board in embracing the sector as an important national socio-economic infrastructure;
  • Infrastructure development in the physical and digital domain continue to pose serious challenges to delivery of quality services;
  • The need to adapt ICTs to postal infrastructure and product development stood out as an area of great interest to member states;
  • Development of addressing and post codes to take advantage of opportunities in e-commerce and e-government;
  • Market research to gain deeper knowledge on trends and customer needs will help the sector to improve market share and stay ahead of competition;
  • The importance of expanding the scope of postal activities at the sub-regional, continental and global level merits keen attention as the postal network operates without borders and its advantage is fortified by cooperation and partnerships with stakeholders in other continents;
  • Postal financial services are importance revenue earners for the sector and efforts should be made to develop collaborative and cooperation arrangements with key partners such as IFAD in order to effectively realize the financial inclusion agenda.

VI Conclusion

Speakers including the chairman, Professor John Nkoma, the UPU Director General, Ambassador Bishar Hussein and PAPU Secretary General, Mr. Younouss Djibrine commended member states for their participation and urged them to harmonize their positions and build a strong voice around the above issues ahead of the UPU strategy conference and the regional round table meetings. The participation of the IFAD representative, Mr. Johannes Boon was noted with much appreciation.

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