Vietnam and Cambodia held a working session to discuss ways to strengthen bilateral cooperation in the fields of post, telecommunications and digital transformation. The event was held within the framework of the ongoing official visit to Cambodia by Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh.
In the session, the Minister of Information and Communications (MIC), Nguyen Manh Hung, and the Cambodian Minister of Post and Telecommunications, Chea Vandeth, briefed each other on several focus areas. These included the current status of each country, management policies, strategic orientations, opportunities and challenges in developing digital infrastructure systems, and promoting digital transformation.
They agreed that their collaboration priorities in the future will include institution cooperation and experience exchange on the building and completion of the legal environment in the field, and the creation of optimal conditions for the promotion of investment, renovation, and digital startups.
The two sides agreed to expand the partnership to include digital human resources, digital skill improvement, organising training courses, and sharing training programmes and documents. They would also support each other in developing digital platforms, especially Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) for online training.
Furthermore, they agreed to increase the sharing of initiatives and effective methods in digital transformation. Also, they will jointly hold conferences to connect digital technology firms from either side, encouraging them to carry out digital transformation projects together. Similarly, Vietnam and Cambodia will create favourable conditions for businesses in the field of telecommunications and digital technology to boost collaboration.
In 2020, Vietnam approved a National Digital Transformation Programme by 2025, with an orientation toward 2030. The strategy helps accelerate digital transformation through changes in awareness, enterprise strategies, and incentives toward the digitalisation of businesses, administration, and production activities.
The programme targets businesses, cooperatives, and business households that want to adopt digital transformation to improve their production, business efficiency, and competitiveness. The plan aims to have 80% of public services at level 4 online. Over 90% of work records at ministerial and provincial levels will be online while 80% of work records at the district level and 60% of work records at the commune level will be processed online.
It also aims to make 50% of banking operations by customers electronic, 50% of the population own digital checking accounts and 70% of customer transactions made through digital channels. 50% of decisions on lending, small, and consumer loans of individual customers are expected to be automated and 70% of work and service records at credit institutions will be processed and stored digitally. By 2030, the government wants the digital economy to contribute around 30% to the GDP. It intends to be among the top 50 countries in e-government development and the third in ASEAN by the end of this decade.
As a part of its digital transformation journey, Vietnam is working with several countries to exchange ideas and boost digital support. In October, a Republic of Korea-Vietnam digital transformation forum was organised by MIC and the RoK Ministry of Science and ICT (MIST). In the same month, Vietnam announced it wants to continue receiving close coordination and assistance from the Japanese government and businesses in promoting their strategic partnership on digital transformation.