Postal services 'suffer technology gap'
Tanzania postal services can be improved more if modern means of communication are applied, Postmaster General Deos Mndeme has said.
Speaking during the anniversary of the World Post Day, Mr Mndeme said that Tanzania Posts Corporation revenue has been rising and its current level is Sh. 20 billion.
Letters sent through the post office inside and outside the country reach 26 million yearly and that the number was rising yearly, he said.
“Post Office services are still needed in Tanzania although there is great competition from more recent means of communication.
The government needs to establish the use of mobile phones in the Post Office in order to widen those services,” he further noted. The government is on the process of buying out Post Office debts so that the corporation loses weight and resumes a competitive conduct of service provision.
In his statement, the chairman of the Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA) Justice Buxton Chipeta said that this year’s commemoration is based on clarifying and making dissemination of the message to the audience with ease on among other things the transportation of prohibited items through the postal system.
He mentioned some of the challenges that the postal sector is facing as globalisation, liberalisation, increasing competition from new services and technologies and the Extraterritorial Offices of Exchange (ETOEs) which require solid policy and regulatory actions to address them.
Presenting his speech on behalf of Deputy Minister for Communication, Science and Technology Dr Maua Daftari, the Permanent Secretary Dr Naomi Katunzi said that currently the postal network of Public Postal Operator consists 400 postal outlets.
She said there is need for the government to think of expansion of the postal network not only to reach the rural areas but to offer innovative services applying emerging technologies.
“There is need to discover more avenues to expand on the use of ICT especially in the rural areas where the majority of our people live,” she said.
However, she said that the government is working diligently to ensure that the postal services meet expectations of the majority of the vast communities.
“The ongoing implementation of new addressing and postcode project is aimed at easing some barriers faced by the postal industry in the country,” she added.
