BUJUMBURA, September 18th (ABP) – On Monday, September 16, 2024, the Minister of Communication, Information Technologies (TIC) and Media, Mrs. Léocadie Ndacayisaba, solemnly opened the 3rd annual forum on posts and postal logistics.
The forum is organized by the East African Communications Organization (EACO).
In her speech, she pointed out that EACO’s objective is to promote the involvement of East African member countries in the development and provision of postal, telecommunications and broadcasting services, and that Burundi is fully in line with that objective. In addition, Ndacayisaba pointed out that the vision of Burundi as an emerging country in 2040 and a developed country in 2060 devotes a special place to that, including the development of the financial services and ICT sectors.
To achieve that, Ndacayisaba specified that the plan is to modernize postal services by adapting payment systems to modern technologies in order to facilitate electronic payments and the sending of mail and parcels. While guaranteeing efficient and secure transport of postal services, she emphasized, the plan is to integrate innovative digital solutions to retain key players in banking services. In the same vein, she reported that remarkable progress has been made, especially in the legal field. According to her, those significant advances can be seen in the promulgation of the law on electronic communications. The latter “establishes a solid legal framework to regulate postal services and digital transactions”.
On the same occasion, Minister Ndacayisaba paints a gloomy picture of the Posts, where they have recorded a negative balance sheet: “the existing report by the International Postal Union shows that postal services will decline by 50% between 2012 and 2022”, she laments. That situation, she says, is attributed to electronic substitution.
The latter is the main factor in the decline of ordinary services, as they do not contain sensitive information that can be replaced by electronic options. As for the decline in value-added services, that is largely attributed to direct competition from other postal service providers. According to Ndacayisaba, the sector faces weaknesses such as delivery speed, reliability, quality and fragility, as well as threats such as electronic substitution, intense competition, changing customer needs and rising costs.
She said she was convinced that the forum would open up prospects for the development of postal services, and thus bring about a positive change in their image, by adapting postal services to current and future trends.