Vietnam will become a leading digital country and economy in the ASEAN region by 2030 and allow testing of new technologies in the digital economy.

This is one of the proposals in a draft project on national digital transformation by the Authority of Information Technology Application (AITA) under the Ministry of Information and Communications (MIC).

The ministry assigned AITA to develop the project and submit it for approval in November. The project aims to realise orientations and policies of the Government to develop the economy based on digital technologies.

Speaking at a conference to review MIC’s activities in the first half of the year this week, Nguyen Thanh Phuc, AITA’s director, said in the draft all people would be able to participate in the digital economy.

Phuc said the main targets would include improving competitiveness of the economy, with an average growth rate of the digital economy reaching 20 percent a year and labour productivity growth of 7 to 10 percent by 2030.

The project also aims for Vietnam to be in the global top 20 and ASEAN top three in terms of the global competitiveness index, as well as building a transparent and effective Government to be in the world’s top 50 in terms of e-government.

In addition, the project plans to have everyone using mobile payment services by 2030.

“Electronic identification will be widely recognised and used by the State to promote not only transactions between people and Governmental agencies but also other transactions in the digital economy,” Phuc said.

The draft expects all Vietnamese people to be equipped with skills to be safe in cyberspace. ICT human resource must meet the country’s development requirements in its digital transformation.

AITA proposed that the digital transformation roadmap in Vietnam would be implemented in three periods. Accordingly, the country would digitalise industrial sectors and implement digital transformation of the economy, society and State agencies in 2020-2022. 

It would focus on digital transformation to improve labour productivity, creating new growth momentum and competitiveness in 2023-25. Vietnam would move towards the development of a comprehensive digital economy and society in the last period of 2026 to 2030.

AITA said Vietnam had paid attention to the application and development of ICT. However, digital transformation had been ignored, thus breakthroughs in terms of models, production processes and products based on data and digital technologies had been lacking.

“For a successful digital transformation, all social components need investment, especially in resolving current shortcomings,” he added.

Network security

The Ministry of Information and Communications clarified that Vietnam needed to develop a safe network security ecosystem. Of which, there would be 100 strong network security businesses in the next two years while 50 network security products and services by Vietnamese firms would be widely used. The number of specialists in the sector would reach some 1,000 people and bring the market to 1-2 billion USD by 2020.

Nguyen Huy Dung, director of the ministry’s Authority of Information Security (AIS) said although Vietnam had a modest position in the world’s network security map, the country still had opportunities to develop.

To realise the target, Vietnam's network security products and services must be widely used around the world. There should be reputable Vietnamese experts working in the world's leading corporations on network security. Security experts should return to Vietnam to start a business, Dung said.

“We expect a wide local market for the development of strong network security companies as well as a safe and trusted cyberspace,” he added.

Each organisation and business should use at least 10 percent of their total spending on IT to ensure network security. They should prioritise local products and services.

Statistics from the ministry show that the network security sector has seen strong development. In the first half of the year, there were 20 firms granted business registration on trading of network security products and services.