Postal operators worldwide need to step up their electronic commerce activities if they are not tomiss out on its development to private competitors.
Electronic services experts – meeting at the Universal Postal Union in Berne, Switzerland,yesterday – said postal operators needed to develop strategies to harness the “enormous potential”of e-commerce.
To benefit from the revolution in electronic trading and transactions, Posts needed to createbetter awareness among customers of the role they already play in the field – increasing, forexample, their visibility on e-commerce portals, the 30-strong group concluded in a workshop.
Postal operators have “unparalleled geographic coverage and a reliable and rapid distributionnetwork,” said António Braquehais, in charge of online services at Brazilian Post. “Furthermore, wehave built solid partnerships, in particular with technology companies, which should enable us toestablish alliances in the area of e-commerce.”
But their selling points – end-to-end distribution, quality of service and monitoring, and asolid financial network – needed better promotion, said the group, if Posts were to distinguishthemselves from stiff competition in the field.
The UPU said it would work on developing international technical standards to facilitatee-commerce and help regulators and postal operators integrate e-commerce in their strategies.
“Throughout the e-commerce supply chain, the UPU plays a role of facilitator,” said PaulDonohoe, head of e-commerce at the UPU.
“During the World Summit on the Information Society, the UPU and governments promised todevelop e-commerce as a means of stimulating economic growth and creating new jobs,” he added.
