Learning about digital transformation applications at the Innovation Startup Festival 2022 in HCMC. (Photo: SGGP)
For people and businesses to benefit In October 2022, the Ministry of Information and Communications directed the development, evaluation, and publication of 16 groups of digital platforms to serve people's needs in terms of digital consumption. Currently, a network of Community Digital Technology Group has been established nationwide. With 40,000 groups in each village and 200,000 members, mainly young people with digital skills, they are willing to go door to door to teach people basic digital skills and support people in using essential digital platforms. By June 2022, the Ministry of Information and Communications had compiled and published 55 digital transformation problems of the ministries, agencies, and localities at the website https://c63.mic.gov.vn. Of these, 35 national digital platforms have been completely developed, announced, and put into use (31 digital platforms have been officially put into use, and four digital platforms are under trial). The Ministry of Information and Communications has also announced 50 digital platforms, including 18 for digital government, 16 for the digital economy, and 16 for the digital society. Currently, 63 out of 63 provinces and cities have been assigned the task of deploying using at least one digital platform; 43 out of 63 localities have announced the selection of digital platforms to integrate into the digital transformation plan. According to the Ministry of Information and Communications, the rate of public services eligible to be provided online at level 4 is 97.3 percent; the rate of online public services generating applications is 45.7 percent, 1.6 times higher than the same period in 2021; online application processing rate is 36.9 percent, up about 10 percent over the same period in 2021. Some online public services have shown remarkable effectiveness in serving people, such as registration services for high school graduation exams, registration and issuance services of license plates for motorbikes, and ordinary passport issuance services. During the implementation process, the Government's overall view is to take people and businesses as the center, the subject, the goal, the motivations, and the resources of digital transformation. Digital transformation must let people and businesses benefit from public services and social utilities more conveniently, quickly, and efficiently, and they create resources for development themselves.Solving real-life problems Vietnam currently has about 14,000 medical facilities, 44,000 schools, nearly 1 million businesses, 5 million individual business households, 9 million farming households, and 26 million households. All are facing the transition to a digital environment. Digital technology is to connect people and things to create together and solve problems posed by real life. The transformation from the real environment to the digital environment will only bring breakthrough value and success if it is the transformation of the entire population. Institution and technology are considered to be the driving force, the two engines of the digital transformation machine. According to Deputy Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Huy Dung, for all people to participate in digital transformation quickly, digital technology must bring utilities like electricity and water. That is, digital technology must be provided as an essential and ubiquitous service. The more people use the higher the value and the lower the cost. Digital platforms are the key to solving this problem. They are broadband telecommunications infrastructure, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, digital identity and authentication, big data, and network security, provided to all businesses and people at affordable and easily accessible prices. “When digital platforms provide technology as a widely-used service, digital technology will become an input factor in society's production and business activities. That is also the time when digital technology is absorbed in every grain of rice, every sweet potato, and all aspects of Vietnamese people's lives," emphasized Mr. Nguyen Huy Dung.
By mid-October 2022, the National Public Service Portal had more than 3.2 million registered accounts, over 828 million visits, more than 7.7 million turns of utility services, and more than 5.6 million records made online. The online payment system of the National Public Service Portal was put into operation, and there were more than 3 million online payment transactions with an amount of more than VND3 billion from March 2020 to October 2022.
