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The British £1 stamp for the 1929 Postal Union Congress, designed by Harold Nelson.

The Postal Union Congress is the main international meeting of the Universal Postal Union, used to discuss various issues affecting international postal services, such as legislation, the political climate, and other strategic issues. The first congress was held in Bern, Switzerland in 1874, and was attended by delegates from 22 countries, most of them European. The meetings are normally held every four years, although they were cancelled during the two World Wars.^[1] Extraordinary Meetings can also be called outside the four-year cycle.

Delegates are usually presented with special albums of stamps by the other participating countries, to cover the period since the previous congress.

Quadrennial Congresses

Number	Year	Location	Topic
1st	1874	Bern, Switzerland	System of base rates developed.^[2]
2nd	1878	Paris, France	Colour coding of postage stamps,^[2] international parcel post service proposed by Germany.^[3]
3rd	1885	Lisbon, Portugal	Reply-paid postcards authorised.^[2]
4th	1891	Vienna, Austria-Hungary	Rules about Paquebots.^[2]
5th	1897	Washington, D.C., United States	Cheaper international postage.^[2]
6th	1906	Rome, Italy	Free postage for prisoners of war.^[2]
7th	1920	Madrid, Spain	Meter mail and window envelopes approved.^[2]
8th	1924	Stockholm, Sweden
9th	1929	London, United Kingdom	Postage paid franking approved,^[2] first airmail regulations.^[4]
10th	1934	Cairo, Egypt
11th	1939	Buenos Aires, Argentina	Introduction of Fonopost.^[2]
12th	1947	Paris, France	UPU becomes the specialized agency of the United Nations.
13th	1952	Brussels, Belgium	Approval of Aerogrammes.^[2]
14th	1957	Ottawa, Canada
15th	1964	Vienna, Austria
16th	1969	Tokyo, Japan
17th	1974	Lausanne, Switzerland
18th	1979	Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
19th	1984	Hamburg, West Germany	^[5]
20th	1989	Washington, D.C., United States	^[6]
21st	1994	Seoul, South Korea	^[7]
22nd	1999	Beijing, People's Republic of China	^[8]
23rd	2004	Bucharest, Romania	^[9]
24th	2008	Geneva, Switzerland	^[10] Original location was Nairobi, Kenya. Postponed due to political unrest after elections in 2007.
25th	2012	Doha, Qatar
26th	2016	Istanbul, Turkey
27th	2021	Abidjan, Ivory Coast	Postponed from 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic

Extraordinary Congresses

Number	Year	Location	Topic
1st	1900	Bern, Switzerland	25th anniversary of the UPU^[11]
2nd	2018	Addis Ababa, Ethiopia	Sustainability of the postal sector^[11]
3rd	2019	Geneva, Switzerland	Remuneration of small packets^[11]
4th	2023	Riyadh, Saudi Arabia	Opportunities to expand membership^[12]^[13]

References

^ "The Universal Postal Union (UPU)". Worldmark Encyclopedia of Nations. Encyclopedia. 2007. Retrieved 2010-03-25.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j "The Evolution of the Postal Service in the Era of the UPU" by Jamie Gough in The London Philatelist, Vol.114, No. 1331, December 2005, pp.362-363.
^ The international parcel service, which allowed the orderly shipment of mailed packages and parcels from one country to another according to predetermined rates, was established by the Universal Postal Union on 1 October 1881 (Great Britain, India, The Netherlands and Persia, 1 April 1882), following the agreement of 9 October 1880 in Paris. The service was difficult to introduce as in several countries the carriage of parcels was a monopoly of the railway companies, and Egypt, Great Britain, India, Canada and Italy all initially claimed that there was no parcel service in their country. Source: "The Universal Postal Union: Its History and Progress. A paper read before the Leeds Philatelic Society by E. Egly, President, on December 19th, 1905." in The London Philatelist, Vol. XV, No. 169, January 1906, pp. 2-11.
^ "THE POSTAL HISTORY OF ICAO – 1927: Airline companies officially recognized as airmail carriers". International Civil Aviation Organization. Archived from the original on 2009-03-06. Retrieved 18 March 2010.
^ United Nations Staff (1985). Yearbook of the United Nations, Vol. 39. The Netherlands: United Nations, Department of Public Information. p. 1342. ISBN 0-7923-0503-5.
^ "Arago: 20th UPU Congress Issue". Arago: Smithsonian National Postal Museum. Retrieved 2009-04-19.
^ U.S. Postal Service : Postal and Telecommunications Sector Representation in International Organizations. Washington: United States General Accounting Office. 1998-10-29. p. 39. ISBN 9781428974852.
^ "The 22nd UPU Congress". China Post. Archived from the original on January 19, 2005. Retrieved 2009-04-19.
^ "Andorra führt Postleitzahlen ein" (in German). Andorra Intern. 2004-02-27. Retrieved 2009-04-19.
^ International Geneva Yearbook 2009, Volume 21. Geneva: United Nations. 2008. p. 179. ISBN 978-92-1-000161-8.
^ ^a ^b ^c "Frequently Asked Questions: Third Extraordinary Congress | UPU". Universal Postal Union. 17 September 2019.
^ "4th Extraordinary Congress". Universal Postal Union. 1 October 2023.
^ "Saudi Arabia hosts postal union conference". Arab News. 1 October 2023.