Prime Minister: Developing digital economy with 4 pillars, important driving force for rapid and sustainable development

On the afternoon of December 28, the National Committee on Digital Transformation held a meeting to review activities in 2023 and directions and tasks for 2024. Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh - Chairman of the National Committee on Digital Transformation chaired the meeting.

Attending the meeting were Deputy Prime Minister Tran Luu Quang - Permanent Vice Chairman of the National Committee on Digital Transformation. At the Nghe An province bridge, Comrade Nguyen Duc Trung - Deputy Secretary of the Provincial Party Committee, Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee chaired.

VIETNAM'S DIGITAL ECONOMY IS THE FASTEST GROWING ECONOMY IN SOUTHEAST ASIA

The World Intellectual Property Organization ranked Vietnam's Innovation Index in 2023 at 46th place, up 2 places compared to 2022. Vietnam's national digital transformation index from 2020 to 2022 increased by 48%, from 0.48 to 0.71. In 2023, this index is forecast to reach 0.75.

Google's report assessed that Vietnam's digital economy growth rate is the fastest in Southeast Asia for two consecutive years, 3.5 times higher than the GDP growth rate. The Ministry of Information and Communications estimates that the proportion of the digital economy in Vietnam's GDP in 2023 will reach 16.5%.

Vietnam's digital economic growth rate is about 20% per year, 3 times higher than the GDP growth rate. In 2023, Vietnam had more than 1,500 Vietnamese digital technology enterprises with revenue from foreign markets, an increase of more than 7% compared to 2022. By the end of 2023, ministries and branches had cut and simplified nearly 2,500 business regulations, simplifying 528/1,086 administrative procedures.

The National Digital Transformation Program, the National Strategy for the Development of Digital Government, Digital Economy and Digital Society set 62 goals by 2025, of which 18 have been completed, 27 are highly likely to be completed and 17 require continued efforts. The 2023 plan sets 126 tasks, of which 102 have been completed, reaching a rate of 81%.

State agencies have put into operation and exploited 7 national databases. The rate of ministries and provinces that have identified the database list is 64%. In the period of 2021-2023, the Ministry of Information and Communications will coordinate telecommunications enterprises to provide mobile coverage in 2,433/2,853 signal depression areas.

By the end of 2023, 81% of administrative procedures will be implemented as online public services. In terms of efficiency, the ratio of online submissions to the total number of administrative procedure settlements will reach 38.3%, saving an estimated 37 million working hours, equivalent to VND 1,274 billion.

Vietnam's digital economy continues to grow rapidly at a rate of about 20%, 3 times faster than GDP growth. The proportion of adults with bank accounts is over 77%, with Vietnamese adults having bank accounts increasing by 51% compared to 2022.

At the meeting, ministries, branches, localities and enterprises reported on the results of implementing digital transformation tasks; shared some lessons learned; pointed out difficulties and problems in practice and proposed and recommended solutions.

DEVELOPING A COMPREHENSIVE, EFFECTIVE DIGITAL ECONOMY

Concluding the meeting, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh emphasized that digital transformation is the key and breakthrough task of the Government in this term. Digital transformation activities in 2023 have achieved over 6 outstanding points, completely consistent with the practical situation.

The Prime Minister sincerely thanks, highly appreciates, and warmly commends the efforts of ministries, branches, localities, businesses, and individuals in 2023; at the same time, requests that they frankly acknowledge the limitations, shortcomings, and weaknesses; and propose solutions to overcome them in the coming time.

Emphasizing the direction of digital transformation in 2024, the Prime Minister agreed on the topic:“Developing a digital economy with 4 pillars: Industry, information technology; digitalization of economic sectors; digital governance; digital data - Important driving force for fast and sustainable socio-economic development”.

The perspective of digital transformation is to always have innovative thinking and strategic vision in digital transformation. Therefore, the thinking must be clear, the determination must be high, the effort must be great, the action must be drastic, with scientific methods, closely following reality, inheriting the achieved results, creating comprehensive and overall breakthroughs, leaving no one behind, strongly applying science and technology, promoting innovation...

The Prime Minister emphasized that developing a digital economy takes knowledge and digital data as the main production factors, digital technology as the core driving force and modern digital infrastructure as an important foundation; accelerating the economic restructuring process, associated with innovation of growth models, governance models, civilization and modernity.

Promoting proactiveness, creativity, mobilizing all resources, and the participation of the entire political system, people, and businesses to develop the digital economy; building mechanisms and policies, attracting and utilizing all resources to strongly promote all resources, digital applications, synchronous, modern, highly interconnected digital data, as a basis for the development of e-commerce and convenient digital services.

Developing the digital economy in a comprehensive and holistic manner, but prioritizing quality over quantity, focusing on four main priorities: industry, information technology and communications; digitalizing economic sectors associated with increasing labor productivity; digital governance, ensuring rapid development; digital data; comprehensive and effective exploitation of the National Population Database.

As a key task in the coming time, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh requested the National Committee on Digital Transformation and the Steering Committees for Digital Transformation of ministries, branches and localities to urgently issue a digital transformation plan for 2024 and organize its effective implementation. The activities of the Committee and Steering Committees must be substantive and avoid formalities.

Build and perfect institutions, mechanisms and policies for national digital transformation; inspect, monitor and measure digital transformation, thereby removing difficulties and obstacles, promoting faster digital transformation.

Ministries and sectors continue to develop roadmaps to complete digital transformation activities according to assigned functions and tasks. Sectors organize thematic meetings according to their tasks.