Promoting information technology in administrative reform

New step forward

Since the beginning of 2017, Nghe An has officially launched the “Nghe An Provincial Online Public Service Portal”, and successfully deployed the VNPT-iOffice document management and operation system to 100% of agencies, units, localities, schools, and public health facilities in the whole province. The system has been put into operation to meet the requirements of document interconnection at 4 levels: Government - Province - District - Commune.

With the VNPT- IGate system, it has created favorable conditions for organizations and individuals who need to resolve administrative procedures quickly and conveniently at a single access address. The advantage of the service is that citizens and businesses can communicate with the government 24/24 hours a day, anywhere with an internet connection. Up to now, the electronic one-stop system has been provided to all provincial departments, branches, 21 district/town/city People's Committees and 480 commune/ward People's Committees across the province.

Training on information technology application for provincial officials and civil servants. Photo courtesy

The system is currently capable of providing public administrative services with 5,783 services (4,749 level 2 procedures; 987 level 3 procedures and 47 level 4 procedures). After more than 2 years of operation, there have been more than 520,000 records updated, circulated and processed on the system, an average of 1,000 records/day. At the same time, through the application of IT, online conferences from the Central to the Provincial People's Committees; from the province to the districts, towns, cities, and sectors have been organized, saving time and travel costs.

Delegates cut the ribbon to inaugurate the Business Support Electronic Information Portal. Photo: Thanh Le

According to Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee Le Ngoc Hoa, the development of technology, especially IT, creates many opportunities for economic development, changing the administration work more quickly and effectively. The application of IT has created significant progress as well as a "push" for the province in developing telecommunications infrastructure, building e-government, contributing to creating a transparent and modern public administration, developing the economy - society in the area. At the same time, the deployment of many software helps the government and political system reform administrative procedures, reduce paper documents.

Department of Finance staff use software to issue online codes for units at level 4. Photo: Thanh Le

Nowadays, with just one handheld device connected to the internet, going to the domain name: http://namdantourism.vn, tourists can access and search for information about the exciting trip they will enjoy according to contents such as history, culture, scenic spots, accommodation, hotel room prices, restaurants, food, shopping places, tourist attractions... in Uncle Ho's hometown.

In particular, these locations are all integrated with digital maps to help visitors easily find the desired locations; support visitors to experience before visiting. From there, visitors can quickly choose programs and itineraries that suit their own needs and interests. The Smart Tourism Information Portal system and Smart Tourism Application on mobile devices VNPT Smart Tourism Nam Dan district were put into testing since February 2019, officially opened and put into operation on April 24.

“Through the application of IT, putting the Smart Tourism Portal into operation is considered a breakthrough solution, not only creating utilities to attract tourists but also contributing to supporting State management agencies and businesses in the district to build high-quality tourism services.”

Comrade Nguyen Hong Son - Vice Chairman of Nam Dan District People's Committee

Tourists visit Kim Lien Relic Site (Nam Dan). Photo courtesy

As for the health sector, to contribute to improving the quality of health services, the sector has increased the application of IT in medical examination and treatment facilities and reformed administrative procedures in the process of health insurance payment between the Social Insurance agency and medical examination and treatment facilities. Thanks to that, it has responded more promptly to medical examination and treatment at the facility, creating high consensus and response among the people...

The system has fully met the requirements set by the Ministry of Health, connecting between provincial/district/commune levels. In operation since 2016, the system has had more than 5,200,000 medical examination and treatment records entered into the system, an average of 8,000 records/day, exporting data to the Appraisal Portal and ensuring payment settlement issues with Vietnam Social Security.

Application of information technology in the medical field. Photo: Thanh Le

Building e-government

It is considered a top locality in the country in applying IT and communication. In addition to the achieved results, according to the assessment of the Department of Information and Communication, Nghe An's IT still has some shortcomings and limitations that need to be addressed to improve the quality of services such as: The province has not yet established a data integration center; IT infrastructure has developed rapidly but has not yet met the requirements of the application: the number of desktop computers and LAN systems is still lacking and not synchronized. Data is still scattered, not standardized and not widely shared among units, as a basis for connecting operations and simplifying administrative procedures for people... Providing online public services is considered an important step in the administrative reform program and implementing e-Government. However, in the past, the number of people using this service in the province has remained limited.

"The reason why online public services have not been used by many people is because the ability to access and use information technology of a part of the people is still low, they do not know how to use and access to transact administrative procedures online", Deputy Director of the Department of Information and Communications - Mr. Phan Nguyen Hao explained.

“On the other hand, due to concerns about information security when using online public services, many people still choose the traditional way of going directly to the authorities."

Comrade Phan Nguyen Hao - Deputy Director of Department of Information and Communications

Handling administrative procedures at the One-Stop Department of the Department of Planning and Investment. Photo courtesy

Resolution 26 of the Politburo sets the goal of building Nghe An into an industrial and technological center of the North Central region and building Vinh city into a smart city. To achieve the above goal, the province is currently focusing on building a Public Administration Service Center, making efforts to build e-government and IT is considered one of the key solutions to reform administration in the direction of service, transparency and efficiency. Building a smart government model, effectively serving people and businesses, attracting investment resources.

According to the Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee, Thai Thanh Quy, the province has a strategic cooperation plan with VNPT Group to solve existing problems in the field of e-government. In particular, the province proposed that VNPT Group continue to cooperate effectively in 5 areas: Providing telecommunications and information technology infrastructure to meet the needs of implementing e-government in the province; Applying information technology to serve people and businesses; Building a comprehensive solution for information security and e-government in the province; Training human resources for telecommunications - information technology; Cooperating in the field of telecommunications - information technology industry, contributing to Nghe An's early and successful implementation of Resolution 26 of the Politburo on building Nghe An into an industrial - technological center of the North Central region and building Vinh city into a smart city.

Thanh Vinh. Photo courtesy