2063. 🇦🇺 The Commonwealth’s Greediest Stamp Issuing Postal Administrations Of 2021.

 

 🇦🇺  In previous years I have published lists of the Commonwealth’s greediest postal authorities as judged by the number of philatelic items (basic postage stamps, miniature sheets, sheetlets, machine-dispensed stamps, booklets, stamps for personalisation, ‘collectors sheets’) issued by each postal service during the course of the year. 

  It might be a better measurement to calculate the total face value for each country since a postal administration might issue very few stamps but they might each be of very high face value but this is a much more difficult task beyond the time I have available to find out the values, convert them to pounds and then tot them all up so I will stick with the total number of items measurement since that gives a reasonable impression of what was happening on the Commonwealth new issue front during 2021.

   Unfortunately I seem to have forgotten to have done a similar study of 2020 new issues and so I will compare this year’s figures with those of 2019.

 Position.      Postal service.            Number of items.    Position in 2019

 1.                Australia Post*                                 662                           4.  291 

 2.                Royal Mail                                       190                           5.  268 

3.                Stamperija inscribed Mozambique  180                      2.  765 

4.                Jersey Post                                        132                           6.  159

5.                Isle Of Man Post Office                   110                            7.  154

6.                Singapore Post                                   98                            10.  80

7.                Guernsey Post**                                97                             3.  342

8.                Stamperija inscribed Maldives          84                                  -

9.                New Zealand Post                              83                             9.  116

10.              IGPC inscribed Grenada   ***           75                            11.  73

11.              Bangladesh Post                                 61                                   -

12.              Canada Post                                       58                            12.  71

13.              Sri Lanka Post                                   51                             18.  55

14.              IGPC inscribed The Gambia             49                             15.  69

15.             Royal Gibraltar Post Office               45                              17.  59

* includes all names inscribed on Australia Post stamps (‘Australia’, ‘Australian Antarctic Territory’, ‘Christmas Island’, ‘Cocos (Keeling) Islands’ and ‘Norfolk Island’).

** includes Guernsey Post issues inscribed ‘Guernsey’ or ‘Alderney’.

*** includes products inscribed ‘Grenada ‘ or ‘Grenada Carriacou And Petite Martinique’.

Note - the first place in 2019 was occupied by Stamperija inscribed Sierra Leone with a total of 1566 items. No items appear to have been released from that source during 2021.

The Commonwealth’s least greedy postal administrations during 2021:-

1=           Anguilla Post Office.                        0

1=           Cam Post (Cameroon).                     0

1=           Dominica Post Office.                      0

1=           eSwatini Post and Telecommunications      0

1=           Ghana Post                                       0

1=           Lesotho Post Office.                        0

1=           Montserrat postal service                0

1=           Nauru Post (Naoeru Post)               0

1=           Iposita (Rwanda postal service)      0

1=           Saint Lucia Post Office.                  0

1=           Samoa Post                                     0

1=           Salpost (Sierra Leone)                    0

1=           Solomon Islands Postal Corporation      0

1=           Posta (Tanzania).                            0

1=           Tokelau postal service                   0

1=           Turks And Caicos postal service   0

1=           Zambia Postal Services Corporation   0

18           Postal Corporation of Kenya         1 

19=        Belize Post Office.                         3

19=         Pos Uganda                                   3

  It does seem extraordinary that Australia Post had a new issue programme during 2021 which was of Stamperija proportions. What a shame - the ruin of new issue collecting continues and Australia Post, Royal Mail, the postal services of the United Kingdom’s offshore islands are leading the charge and sucking the lifeblood out of the hobby.

  🇬🇬 If Guernsey Post’s record seems a little better in 2021, it is a temporary blip as it intends to recommence issuing Post and Go strips of 6 with numerous different inscriptions to welcome cruise ship passengers who are landing on the island. This has not been possible or worthwhile during the past two years because of the pandemic. 

  The Guernsey Information Centre will dispense strips of the 6 Guernsey Cuisine Post and Go stamps on 21 April 2022 with the added inscription G.I.C./Bianvnu à Guernesi and then have an inscription to welcome the season’s first visiting cruise ship, the Spirit of Adventure and subsequently the other visiting cruise ships will be similarly philatelicly commemorated.