The 24th Congress of the Universal Postal Union (UPU) was held from last 23 July to 12 August in Geneva, attended by nearly 2,500 people, plenipotentiaries from 179 of the 191 Union member countries.
Almost 600 proposals were examined, the result of work carried out over the last four years. The most relevant decisions include the following:
- Approval of the new world postal strategy, the Nairobi Postal Strategy, which consists of the Union's roadmap for the next four years. It comprises four goals to apply beginning in January 2009 and stresses the postal sector’s importance in the economic and postal development of the Union's member countries;
- The new payment services agreement, applicable to the agreement's signatory countries, which updates the previous version adopted at the Bucharest Congress;
- Revision of the Terminal Dues system and the classification of countries and territories to apply during the 2010-2013 period. Terminal dues consist of the remuneration the destination postal administration has the right to receive from the expediting postal administration as compensation for the expenses incurred in the destination country for handling received mail objects. Revision of the terminal dues system is thus extremely important for postal administrations, given the financial impact of its application. This terminal dues system has two subsystems: a target system, which will be applied to exchange flows between the current and new target system countries (countries more developed in terms of postal development) and a transition system, to be applied to exchange flows with and among transition system countries, applicable to the countries with a less developed level of postal development;
- Modifications of the acts, specifically with respect to replacement of the term ''postal administration'' by ''Member State'' or ''designated operator'' (or combination thereof), with a view to adjusting UPU instruments to the current situation in the postal sector, namely the increasing separation of functions and responsibilities between operator and regulator/government;
- Progress in UPU reform, particularly vis-à-vis the clarification and separation of functions between the Council of Administration (CA) and the Postal Operations Council (POC);
- The policy of co-operation for development of the Universal Postal Union for the 2009-2012 period;
- Approval of the financial plan for the next four-year period. After more than 10 years the nominal zero growth policy was abandoned, even though the increase allowed for the budget ceiling is relatively insignificant.
Regarding the Congress's election processes, Edouard Dayan and Guozhong Huang, respectively the only candidates for the positions of Director General and Vice Director General, were re-elected by acclamation. Portugal was re-elected to the POC, even though it was unable to achieve re-election to the CA.
The only country candidate to host the next UPU Congress, Qatar, was elected by acclamation and will hold the event in 2012 in Doha.
