The new ‘.post’ platform for international electronic postal services was officially launched atthe Universal Postal Congress in Doha yesterday with a call on the 192 member countries to “get on
board”.The platform, based on a unique top-level domain in the internet, is now available to the UPU’smember countries for exploitation, the UPU announced. The .post platform is intended to replicatein the electronic world the same conditions that the UPU created in the physical world for theglobal exchange of electronic mail items on a secure and reliable single territory, which alsobrands legitimate postal services on the Internet.
“A new era is starting for the UPU. Get aboard now. This has just started,” outgoing UPUDirector General Edouard Dayan appealed to delegates. He described the launch as a “historic day”creating a new postal space on the internet and which took the vision of the UPU founders “into anew dimension”.
“Today the platform is ready. It is no longer a dream but a space available for use. It is yourspace to use,” he declared.
Dayan said that the .post platform gave postal operators a tool to develop electronic servicessuch as e-post, e-finance, e-commerce and e-government services. The UPU sees a wide range ofelectronic services being offered through the platform, including identity management, e-shops,e-payments, e-forms, secure postal mailboxes, address management, hybrid mail and advertisingmail.
Secure e-commerce would enable SMEs to offer cross-border services, for example, Dayan said. TheEMS express mail service, linking some 176 postal operators worldwide, will also be developed as anelectronic service on the platform, he pointed out.
At present, Poste Italiane, which has contributed €500,000 and technical expertise for theproject, is testing the platform in cooperation with PostNL, while China Post is testing severalapplications.
The UPU said that while postal e-services still contribute modestly to revenues, Posts aremaking strides in adapting to new realities or intend to progressively develop postal e-services,while maintaining the efficiency of their traditional services.
According to the latest UPU statistics, released for today’s World Postal Day, there was acontinuation of clear trends in the global postal sector last year, including a decline ofletter-post volumes, the growth of parcels as e-commerce evolves and Posts progressively enter thelogistics industry, and the continuing growth of postal financial services, which increasinglygenerate a greater share of postal revenues.
Letter-post still accounts for 48% of global postal revenues of $304 billion but in somecountries postal financial services account for more than 50% of the revenues, the postalorganisation pointed out.
