Arab world's total postal income grows by 21.6%
Dubai: Total operating income from the Arab world’s postal services grew 21.6 per cent to USD1.34 billion last year, according to the Universal Postal Union (UPU).
Compared to this, Emirates Post last year reported net profits of Dh133 million.
Postal authorities of the 21 Arab countries that serve 310 million people through 17,000 offices, also employ 119,000 people, which is 2.2 per cent of the 5.5 million world postal workforce.
Nearly 70 per cent of the Arab postal administrations are public. The Arab postal authorities last year handled 1.2 billion domestic, 285 million international letter posts and 1.4 million percels.
About 39.9 per cent of all the mails were letter post while 28.1 per cent parcel post and 28.4 per cent other products and services.
Meanwhile, postal officials identified technology as the single largest challenge to the growth of this important communication sector.
“Our society has dramatically changed since the establishment of the UPU, especially during the last two decades,” Pascal Lamy, director-general of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), told the delegates at the UPU Strategy Conference that kicked off on Tuesday.
“Many new means of communication have emerged with the information technology revolution. Yet communication remains more important than ever in the current wave of globalisation.
New wireless and internet technologies can be faster and even sometimes cheaper means than traditional postal services. They have presented particular challenges to the postal sector.”
Sultan Bin Saeed Al Mansouri, UAE Minister of Government Sector Development and Chairman of Emirates Post, said,
“Postal corporations need to increase cooperation and enhance the transfer of technology and keep pace with the changing environment. In this respect, I am happy to say the UPU has been playing a major role in promoting cooperation among the 191 member countries. UPU has been actively promoting efficient movement of mail at affordable rates and helping member countries raise standards by adopting new systems and high technologies.”
“Keeping pace with the booming national economy, we have implemented plans to emerge as one of the leading players in the postal and related fields in our region. I am happy to say that Emirates Post has achieved a high degree of success in this endeavour, as reflected in our increased revenues and higher mail volumes. We are now in the process of adding several new non-postal services to our existing portfolio.”
Shaikh Maktoum Bin Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, chairman of the Dubai Technology and Media Free Zone Authority, on Tuesday inaugurated the conference in which over 1,000 postal decision makers and experts from over 130 countries are attending to chart a new strategy for global postal services.
