ANACOM held a roundtable discussion on World Post Day to discuss the role of innovation in the development of the postal sector. This initiative saw participation by Francisco de Lacerda (CEO of CTT - Correios de Portugal), Olivier Establet (CEO of Chronopost), João Carlos Duarte (Director of Iberomail), and João Cadete de Matos (Chairman of ANACOM). The debate was moderated by Rogério Carapuça, President of APDC - Associação Portuguesa para o Desenvolvimento das Comunicações (Portuguese Communications Development Association).
The session was held at FPC - Fundação Portuguesa das Comunicações (Portuguese Communications Foundation), in Lisbon, beginning at 6 pm.
The round table was preceded by the award of prizes for the "2018 Best letter competition”, the launch of the commemorative stamp "500 years of Post in Portugal, 3rd Series: Postal Objects through the ages" and the inauguration of the exhibition "Route of the Post Office - Beating the Distance”.
Proceedings were brought to a close by the Secretary of State for Infrastructure, Guilherme d'Oliveira Martins.
Trends in postal services in the first half of 2018
In the first half of 2018, postal services reported a 6.2% reduction in total traffic and 4% in revenues, with average revenue per item increasing by 2.3%
In the first half of 2018, the 6.2% reduction in total postal traffic (falling to 385.5 million items) resulted from a 6.4% traffic decrease in correspondence, a 7.5% decrease in editorial mail traffic and a 12.3% decrease in direct mail, partially offset by an 11.3% increase in parcel traffic.
Average revenue per item increased by 2.3% compared to the same period of 2017, due to a combination of several factors: a 6.2% decline in traffic, a 4% reduction in revenues, an increase in CTT's prices applied in April and changes to the structure of traffic, specifically the proportional increase in parcel traffic.
Postal traffic per capita fell to 37.5 postal items per inhabitant and per six-month period – a reduction of 2.4 items compared to the same period of 2017.
Correspondence traffic made up about 79.4% of total postal traffic, direct mail 8.1%, editorial mail 7% and parcels 5.5%.
About 82.9% of traffic was covered by the scope of the universal service. Items distributed to the national market made up 96.1% of the total, while the remaining 3.9% were distributed to other countries.
In terms of market share, Grupo CTT reported a share of about 91.2% of total postal traffic, 1.6 percentage points less than in the same period of 2017. Grupo CTT also reported a share of about 97.5% of universal service traffic.
Revenues generated by postal service providers amounted to 313.9 million euros, falling 4% from the same period of 2017, although revenues from parcels increased by 10.2%. Traffic revenues covered by the universal service represented 64.3% of the total.
At the end of June, there were 14.8 thousand people employed in the operation of postal services, 0.2% less than in the same period of 2017.
The number of network access points increased by 0.6%, the number of distributions centres increased by 3.2% and the vehicle fleet increased by 4.2%. This increase in access points occurred alongside a 5.4% reduction in the number of CTT post offices.
As regards other material resources (wholly owned by the universal service concessionaire), there was a year-on-year increase in the number of post boxes (+ 0.5%) and decreases in the number of PO Boxes (-1.4% ), the number of automatic stamp vending machines (-35.3%) and the number of outlets selling only stamps (-7.5%).
Consult the statistical report:
- Postal services - 1st half of 2018 https://www.anacom.pt/render.jsp?contentId=1461750
Further information:
- Comemoração do Dia Mundial dos Correios 2018 http://www.fpc.pt/pt/?event=dia-mundial-dos-correios-inauguracao-do-percurso-dos-correios-e-sessao-institucional&event_date=2018-10-09
- 2018 Message from the Director General http://www.upu.int/en/the-upu/world-post-day/2018-message-from-the-dg.html
- Statement by António Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations, on the occasion of World Post Day, 9 October 2018 http://news.upu.int/no_cache/nd/statement-by-antonio-guterres-secretary-general-of-the-united-nations-on-the-occasion-of-world-post-day-9-october-2018/
