The 48th plenary meeting of CEPT's European Committee for Postal Regulation (CERP) took place on 23-24 May in the Norwegian city of Kristiansand.
It was attended by representatives from 27 countries as well as observers from the European Commission (EC), the International Bureau (IB) of the Universal Postal Union (UPU) and PostEurop.
The plenary meeting considered and discussed reports from the CERP steering committee, the contact committees (CERP/EC and CERP/PostEurop) and the CERP working groups (WG UPU and WG Policy). The chair reported the signing of the MoU between CERP and the UPU on the occasion of the recent meeting of the UPU Council of Administration.
A number of presentations were also given:
- On the cooperation mission in Sudan conducted by experts from CERP members, per the cooperation relations between CERP and the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA);
- On results from recent meetings of the UPU Councils (the CA and the POC Postal Operations Council), given by the IB representative from the UPU;
- On regulatory developments in the postal sector at European Union level, given by the EC representative.
A forum on CERP's future was also held. The main concern indicated by speakers and participants' comments was the need for CERP's work to focus more on European coordination of UPU-related work, as done by the other CEPT committee, Com-ITU, responsible for coordination with the ITU, given that regulation activities are now carried out at European Regulators Group for Postal Services (ERGP) level. Some considered that there was also room for sharing experiences/cooperation between regulators and ministries, as currently occurs.
The next CERP plenary meeting will be held in May 2014 at a date and place still to be confirmed.
