Ecuador

Update: January 2023

by Richard Zimmermann

Without specific priority, the following descriptions collects information provided by friends since beginning of the year. Many thanks to Enzo Cafaro – Italy, Don Birchel – USA, Wayne Chen – USA, Jaap Sarelse – the Netherlands, Roland Montagne – France, David Dubin – USA, Souvik Ghatak – India, Milan Csaplar – Slovakia and Kenneth Sequeira – Singapore.

In the continuation of the production of Arab countries stamps celebrating the 2022 FIFA soccer worldcup, next to Jordan and Oman (stamps issued on December 18, 2022), we learned that the exact date of issue of the Qatar souvenir sheet was January 17, 2023. Obviously this series is not yet complete.

During the official visit of President of Egypt, Mr. Abdel Fattah El-Sisi to India, a joint stamp on the “75th Anniversary of Diplomatic Relations” (1948-2023) was released in form of a souvenir sheet which theme is rivers, The Ganges (India) and The Nile (Egypt) are represented on the stamps. Release date was January 25, 2023. However, so far, there are no information from the Egyptian side about a similar product. Actually, Egypt had issued on August 18, 2022 and unilateraly, a stamp celebrating this anniversary. Unfortunately, there are great chances that this Indian souvenir sheet remains unilateral as well and just corresponds to the counterpart of the 2022 Egyptian stamp. Therefore, these two items cannot be considered as joint (yet).

Poland issued on January 29, 2023 a stamp dedicated to the 550th birthday of Nicolaus Copernicus. This celebration is still reported in the Vatican philatelic program as joint stamp with Poland, but Vatican State has not released anything so far. So, we need to wait for news from this state before adding this issue in the catalogue. Due to the difference in time for issuing their stamps, this pair can now only become a concerted issue, providing also the design remains the same. If the design is different, then it does not even have a joint character.

Wayne Chen (USA) could announce the publication of his newest article on Crypto stamps, published in Linn’s Stamp News on line on February 4, 2023 (printed form publication date February 20, 2023), which also made the cover story for the monthly version of the magazine. At the end of the article, a list of the stamps mentioned in the article that were issued 2018-2022 is provided for those interested in this new (and expensive) collection. regarding our interests, the mixed cover of the first joint crypto issue (Austria – Netherlands [T20220922] is reproduced. It was provided by Jaap Sarelse (the Netherlands).

A new item from Ecuador associated to the 2022 Ecuador – Mexico joint issue [T20220728] appeared as well, late after the official issue date. A souvenir sheet, vertical form size 65x185mm, without gum and stamp with same denomination ($0.75), numbered at the bottom, but priced $5.00 was released by Ecuador. Exact printing run is unknown, but it seems that 5,000 stamps and 3,500 souvenir sheets became available. This item has been added in the catalogue. Also, it is told that the first day cancellation of the stamp exists only at 30 samples. Ecuador post offices are still under reorganization.

The designs of the 100th anniversary of custom treaty stamps involving Liechtenstein and Switzerland were released. These stamps will be sold from March 29, 2023 on.

In terms of new issues to be added in the list of stamps expected to be released during the years 2023 and 2024, we can mention the following:

  • During the year 2023, Morocco plans an exceptionnally large number of joint issues with Oman (May), Romania (August), UAE (November), Kazakhstan (December) on top of its participation to the Euromed series (July)
  • The Cyprus – Israel joint issue will be released on April 4, 2023 and not in February as earlier mentionned
  • Austria – Germany – Slovakia : May 24, 2024 – Limes Romanus of the Upper Danube

Surprise from Ecuador

by Richard Zimmermann

A joint Ecuadorian – Mexican joint issue was initially scheduled for March 23, 2022. In the meantime, the stamp release was delayed two times and still not issued by end of June 2022. Recent information referred to the bankruptcy of the Ecuadorian Post which has not issued stamps for more than two years. As a consequence, we considered this issue as cancelled.

All of a sudden, we learned from Stan80djk that both stamps were officially released on July 28, 2022. Stamps are identical and honor two heroines of independency, Leona Vicario (1789-1842) and Manuela Saenz (1797-1856). Ecuador issued only 2,000 units, while Mexico released 100,000 stamps.

Mid-year review

by Richard Zimmermann

The release of joint stamps is still affected by the coronavirus pandemic situation and, additionally, more recently, by the Ukrainian-Russian war. The situation of the specific program involving Russia was already reported here. How about the other joint issues?

The Japan – Mongolia issue, 50 years of diplomatic relations, eventually proved not to be a true joint issue. Mongolia released a souvenir sheet on May 19, 2022. For Japan, the date of issue was shifted from originally February 14, 2022 to June 15, 2022 and a souvenir sheet with 10 stamps in a different design was released (information provided by Robert Schrijvers, Mongolia).

The Bosnia Herzegovina stamps related to Family Remittances was issued as planned on June 16, 2022 with a design identical to stamps produced earlier and in miniature sheets of 10 stamps (printing run 1,000 miniature sheets). This stamp will simply be added to the original series [B20200716] which was already filed as a Borrowed Design [B], so not a true joint issue. 2020 Catalogue section has been updated with this information. There is no indication of the issuance this year by another country of other stamps related to this topic so far.

We are still missing information from Turkmenistan related to the Turkmenistan-India joint issue. The Indian stamps were released on April 2, 2022.

The commemorative Brazilian stamp featuring the 100th anniversary of James Joyce’s work ‘Ulysses’ was issued within the Brazilian ‘Diplomatic Relations Series’ and dedicated to Ireland. The stamp was issued as scheduled on June 16, 2022, but not as a joint issue. There is no counterpart produced by Ireland at the same date and this issue can be removed from the catalogue.

In the same way, the Italian – Mexico issue initially planned for July 23, 2022 to celebrate diplomatic relations between both countries will probably not take place. On June 28, 2022, Mexico issued a stamp dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the building of the Mexican embassy in Italy. There are no counterparts reported in the Italian philatelic program and there is a great doubt that Italy will change its program within the next weeks.

The Ecuador-Mexico joint issue in honor of the heroes of independency Leona Vicario and Manuela Saenz was not issued on June 1, 2022, as scheduled. It seems the issue of these stamps will again be delayed, as the date had already been changed twice this year. Any information is welcome.

The Cyprus-Israel joint issue that was once listed on the Israel program has disappeared from this list. No stamp was issued on the originally scheduled date of June 28, 2022.

On the positive side, names of countries involved in the next Euromed issue are now accumulating. The present list of countries having guaranteed participation to this issue include: Bosnia Herzegovina (November 15) – Croatia (July 11) – France (July 8) – Greece (July 11) – Portugal (July 11) – Slovenia (July 11) – Tunisia (July 11) – Turkey (July 9). More are to come and, compared to last year, we could expect participation from the following countries as well: Albania, Cyprus, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Malta, Montenegro, Morocco and Spain. The complete list will be published in Volume 15 of the catalogue, after July 11, 2022, the most common and new reference date for this issue. In the meantime, some pictures of the already disclosed projects.

Finally, take a look at this web link of interest, the site of Mark Joseph Jochim, Philatelic Pursuits, which provides information about the stamp issue programs of all countries. It needs to be updated, but it represents a unique and very interesting starting point.