World Post Day-2009

Celebrating World Post Day 2009

Posts around the world marked World Post Day with a number of activities. Hong Kong citizens were allowed to send one letter free of charge through the post. Post Fiji invited the public to visit its main mail processing centre. And Mali Post used the day to launch a nationwide HIV-prevention campaign in its post offices.
World Post day is celebrated annually on 9 October, as this is the date the Universal Postal Union (UPU) was created in Berne in 1874. On this day, posts worldwide draw attention to the importance and value of their services in keeping people and businesses connected through a myriad of activities reminding people that some 438 billion letters and six billion parcels are still sent through the post annually. And financial, logistics and electronic services are also part of the wider range of services posts offer today in an era of increasing electronic communication.
Postal services worldwide employ more than five million people, and some 660,000 postal establishments make up the largest physical distribution network on the planet.
In 2009, the postal sector has felt the pinch of the economic crisis, as weak consumerism and less advertising mail saw some of the world’s largest posts register significant drops in letter-post volumes and revenues. On the other hand, however, the same posts have seen their parcels volumes grow as e-commerce motored along despite the crisis. And posts offering financial services continue to see the number of savings accounts and deposits grow exponentially. On World Post Day, the UPU also celebrated the centenary of its monument, located in Berne and designed by French sculptor René de Saint-Marceaux, who was a native of Reims, France. Celebrations were held in Berne to mark the occasion, with Swiss Post and France’s La Poste issuing stamps.