European Union governments agreed on Monday gradually to open their postal delivery markets to competition, reducing the traditional dominance of national mail monopolies. After more than a year of wrangling, ministers from the 15 EU member states reached a compromise that would open about 40 percent of the bloc’s postal market by 2006, EU single market commissioner Frits Bolkestein said.
Read MoreThe long-standing dispute over the future of Europe’s postal markets reaches a climax tomorrow at a council of EU telecommunications ministers in Luxembourg. EU leaders meeting in Lisbon in March 2000 all agreed to liberalise their markets in a bid to make the European economy more dynamic and competitive.
Belgium, which currently holds the EU presidency, is trying to cobble together a deal which would open 20 per cent of the postal markets to competition in 2006, compared to the present 3 per cent.
The long-standing dispute over the future of Europe’s postal markets reaches a climax tomorrow at a council of EU telecommunications ministers in Luxembourg.
EU leaders meeting in Lisbon in March 2000 all agreed to liberalise their markets in a bid to make the European economy more dynamic and competitive.
Belgium, which currently holds the EU presidency, is trying to cobble together a deal which would open 20 per cent of the postal markets to competition in 2006, compared to the present 3 per cent.
Read MoreThe French post office said it is eyeing partnerships with other postal utilities in Europe following the announcement on Thursday of a tie-up with Post Sweden in the parcels and express sectors. ‘Scandinavia is a very important market for package delivery services and the agreement we’ve reached with Post Sweden extends our European network to some 23 countries,’ La Poste president Martin Vial told Reuters in an interview. La Poste’s external growth activities, particularly in Germany and the U.K., and its partnership agreements in southern Europe, with the Italian and Spanish post offices, signed earlier this year, and now in Scandinavia, with Post Sweden, give the French operator the leading, integrated rapid transport networks in Europe, Vial said.
Read MoreOctober 11, 2001 — Herbert Nielsen, Reuters: “Pan Nordic Logistics (PNL) is maintaining its strategy of joining a major international alliance before the year-end, but this will not be with France’s Chronopost, PNL’s chairman Karre Frydenberg said. PNL was formed by the Danish, Norwegian, Finnish and Swedish post offices but today it was announced that Post Sweden – following Finland – is leaving the group from January next year.
Read MoreThe state mail carriers of Sweden and France, Posten AB and La Poste, agreed Thursday to cooperate on package deliveries and other shipments.
“Our objective is to quickly integrate the new operations and increase volume,” said Lennart Grabe,” president and group CEO of Posten.
La Poste’s 85 percent-owned Direct Parcel Distribution _ one of Europe’s largest package service networks _ may enter into franchise agreements with Posten in the Nordic and Baltic countries, Posten stated in a news release.
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