On April l, 2017 Thailand Post issued a sheet of five stamps—the longest the world has seen, at 170 mm in length—to mark the 70th anniversary of late King Rama IVs accession to the throne. Each of the five stamps features the same design, which includes a series photographs of the king set against a background of luscious green fields. Nine million stamps were printed by the Thai British Security Printing Public Company.

The record set of five stamps contain 6 images of His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej at
work with 6 major research and development centres which were launched by His Majesty for the benefit of the Thai people serving as the backdrop. All these images are joined in a set of stamps that will break the existing world record for the longest set of stamps currently held by Nile River and Singapore River stamp sets. The length of 170 millimetre is significant in that it represents His Majesty’s 70th birthday anniversary which is the only one of its kind in the world.

Another point of major interest is the fact that these stamps will employ the Asian Stamp
Application technology ingrained within the Thailand Post’s logo which when scanned will
generate a 9-minute-long video of all the 6 Royal initiated research and development centres.

The videos showcase the history as well the work that these centres have carried out which when considered makes them ‘living stamps’ able to interact with humans. The stamps are priced at 9 baht each and one complete set will contain 5 stamps of total price of 45 baht.

~Archana Hansaja Jayathilake