Georgian Post Hosts 34th Plenary Session of PostEurop & Business Innovations Forum

Georgian Post hosted the 34th Plenary Session of PostEurop, an event opened by George Kobulia, Minister of Economy and Sustainable Development of Georgia, and Levan Chikvaidze, General Director of Georgian Post.

PostEurop is the European Community Post Union, founded in 1993 in Brussels. The aim of the organization is to support the development of postal businesses and to strengthen partnerships between members, as well as the sustainable growth of international postal products and continuous innovation. Georgian Post has been a full member of PostEurop since 2012.

“Today, PostEurops’ 34th Plenary Session was held in Tbilisi, which is very important and makes Georgia proud,” said Kobulia. “Nowadays, postal operators and the economy of this sector are of great importance. We know that e-commerce is very popular and has an important place in the economies of many countries. Without postal operators, e-commerce would be impossible. There are great expectations from postal operators as to what innovations will be presented, how they will improve the service standards to offer a more flexible and faster service to consumers. I have studied the working process and standards of Georgian Post in detail and the results are most impressive and were achieved in a very short period of time. Many countries saw it and that’s why they chose to gather today in Georgia.”

In the framework of the Meeting, General Director of the Universal Postal Union (UPU), Bishar Hussein, Deputy Director of UPU, Pascal Clivaz, and the heads of 52 postal operators of 49 European countries visited Georgia. The session participants discussed the postal reforms, developments in the postal sphere and the possibilities of strengthening partnerships between members.

On the second day of the plenary assembly, the Business Innovations Forum was held at The Biltmore hotel, for which over 100 companies registered. The focus was postal service innovations in e-commerce, artificial intelligence, automation and digital marketing. The forum made an ideal opportunity for Georgian businessmen and entrepreneurs to meet the top operators in the field, to establish new contacts, share experiences and expand their logistics schemes.

After the plenary session, Chikvaidze summed up the results of the event and talked about its importance. “This event is of special significance as now it’s the 25th anniversary of the existence of PostEurop, and it being held in Georgia is a great honor for Georgian Post. Given how the postal business is developing, talking about e-commerce in particular, we can say that we are already very much invested in this field. We expect very interesting innovative projects from the Forum and it is great that many Georgian businesses will also be in attendance to take advantage of the opportunity to showcase their products as well as to listen to the ideas of others. A new project has been already implemented, ‘Georgian Product to the World,’ with which Georgian Post allows Georgian entrepreneurs to access the largest market, such as electronic and internet sales, with the post offering delivery of their products worldwide.”

At the Session, three Georgian candidates were nominated for the 2020 election of the President of the Universal Postal Union and Deputy, Japan and Switzerland for the Chairperson and Cameroon for the Deputy.

The UPU General Director and Deputy declared that a lot of changes have been made in the Postal Operators’ field in the past six years in Georgia and that the Post is definitely an integral part of the global community, paying attention to inclusivity in society, digital work challenges and current security problems.

“Right now, the biggest challenge for the Post is the decline in the volume of mail,” said Jean-Paul Forceville, the Chairmen of the PostEurop Management Board. “Yet, there are many opportunities open to us and the most obvious one is e-commerce, which is developing in many countries around the world- it’s a very competitive market, with many players. We already have a good level of service that fulfills the needs of the e-mailer and e-merchant, but, as you know, needs evolve quickly. Where, two years ago, people were happy if they had their post within a week, now they expect it in days or even hours, meaning we need to also change our organizations and the way our people work, introduce new services and digitalize, while maintaining the proximity that our customers value.”

By Mariam Merabishvili