Momentum for further EMS growth in Africa

Senior management from ten African postal operators came together to create a shared vision for EMS in Africa in 2024 at a recent EMS symposium. 25 participants travelled to the event on 2-3 May at Grand-Bassam in Côte d’Ivoire to share success strategies and identify regional growth strategies. 

Central to this vision for African EMS in 2024 is a commitment to end-to-end reliability through meeting the EMS Cooperative service standards; working together to improve transport for EMS in Africa and investment in the promotion of EMS in Africa to raise EMS brand awareness.

There is already momentum to improve EMS in Africa. La Poste Côte d’Ivoire has improved its on-time delivery to 98% by November 2018. Senegal Post presented best practice in service performance having maintained on-time delivery of an average of 98% over the last two years leading to export growth of over 120% in 2018 over 2017. NiPost has focussed on its supply chain and has developed excellent relations with Nigerian customs authorities and process improvements resulting in 98% of its inbound EMS are released by customs  in less than 12 hours.  

Africa as a region has its own competitive dynamics. Participants appreciated the strategic analysis of the African e-commerce market and recommendations to stimulate EMS growth. Another focus was transportation, analysing   differences in EMS transport versus competitors in the region and, to help discussions with customers, insights into competitor pricing strategies were shared at the event. 

The participants were inspired by the symposium and left with ideas to improve the EMS service through a better knowledge and understanding of customers, operational best practice, and  go-to-market strategies. All agreed that another EMS symposium for the African region should be considered for 2021 to gauge progress on service performance and to kick-off the EMS Business Plan 2021-2024.

Thanks to La Poste, Côte d’Ivoire for hosting the event.