On March 1, 2008 there were 16 years from the date when the postage stamps of independent Ukraine were put into circulation for the first time. Over this period in Ukraine there were issued more than 800 thematic postage stamps.

The activity on issuing stamps is fulfilled by the creative staff of the Directorate “Publishing House “Marka Ukrainy” pf the State Post Operator “Ukrposhta”. Such artists as Yuriy Logvin, Alexander Kalmykov, Nikolay Kochubey, Vasiliy Vasilenko, Konstantin Lavr, Ekaterina Shtanko, Vladimir Taran, Valeriy Rudenko, Oksana Ternavsaya were involved into cooperation in this field.

In 2006 the Ukrainian artistic postage stamp # 726 “Integration by the eyes of young people” of the series “Europe” was awarded the first place at the International contest for the best postage stamp in this series. This contest is held every year with the countries-members of the Association of European post operators “PostEurope” taking part in it. This Association is an international organization uniting 43 post operators of Europe.

The Englishman Rowland Hill is considered the father of the postage stamp. In 1837 he published his project “Post Office Reform: its Importance and Practicability”, where he offered to introduce a single postage fee throughout the country and the prepayment for mailing by means of stamps. He also proposed the use of an envelope "MailReady", the cost of which included the payment for postal delivery.

The official date of putting stamps into circulation is considered to be the 6^th of May, 1840, after the British Parliament had accepted the proposal of Rowland Hill on introducing a simple and convenient method of payment for mailing into postal practices – that was the sign indicating the cost of a postal service.

Soon afterwards such stamps were put into circulation in other countries: in 1843 in Switzerland and Brazil; in 1847 – in the USA; in 1849 – in France, Belgium, Bavaria; in 1850 – in Austria, Spain, Prussia, Australia; in 1857 – in Denmark, Canada, the Netherlands. The first postage stamp in Russia with the value of 10 kopecks was put into circulation on January 1, 1858.

http://news.liga.net/

Printable version