41. New direct mails were also received from the following offices:
Letter Mail-Air
Montreal (Canada)
Delhi (India)
Mogadiscio (Somalia)
Cuenca (Ecuador)
Letter Mail-Surface
Mexico (504) D.F.
Noumea R.P. (New Caledonia)
Irkutsk (U.S.S.R.)
42. The parcel post service with the People's Republic of China was resumed on 15th October, 1970 and the public response was immediate and overwhelming. The extraordinarily heavy postings, which persisted for a number of weeks, caused considerable difficulties in daily storage and handling of the traffic at various post offices. Additional temporary staff had to be employed to deal with the traffic and it was necessary to utilize emergency accommodation at the vacated Tsim Sha Tsui Fire Station, at Whitfield Barracks, Chatham Camp in Kowloon and at the ex Water Front Police Station in Hong Kong. It was to the credit of the staff that the task was tackled without undue adverse effect on postal facilities.
43. Air mail service continued to be used to a greater extent. The total number of letters and packets posted for air transmission were estimated at 65.9 million, showing an increase of 32.3% over last year's traffic.
44. Parcels exchanged with overseas countries totalled 3.1 million or 14.4% above the 1969-70 level.
45. The outward air parcel traffic rose by 14.9% to a total of approximately 1 million items and represented 39.6% of the total of all parcels despatched from the Colony.
46. Inward parcels passed the half million mark, of these 36.8% came by air.
47. There were 6 cases of violation of mails during transmission to and from the Colony. In no case were the mails violated whilst in custody of this Department.
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