Postal service should use barcodes for normal mail too

PRIME Minister Lee Hsien Loong has announced that a Smart Nation office will be set up in the Prime Minister's Office for Singapore to rely on IT and high-tech systems to improve our productivity. I would like to suggest that we do not forget the bar-coding system and use it extensively as it is also related to IT applications.

Many products on sale in the retail sector have barcodes. It has improved productivity tremendously although not all companies have the IT application to improve on store/inventory management using real-time IT technology. Such an IT application is needed by all sectors of our economy to improve on productivity, and priority should be given to make it available to all as soon as possible.

The postal service has used the barcode system since the 1990s for registered mails. However, not all normal mails use the barcode system to automate mail sorting.