From 2007, e-commerce will demonstrate significant development," Nguyen Thanh Hung, director of the Ministry of Trade's e-commerce department predicted.
More state agencies also started providing administrative services for citizens and enterprises in 2006. The services include electronic license registration, e-customs, and electronic certificates of origin.
The Ministry of Trade's e-commerce department reported that 92 per cent of surveyed enterprises were connected to the internet and 81 per cent used broadband internet connection, or ADSL, for online transactions, up from 89 and 70 per cent a year ago. The legal framework is in place for e-commerce to develop more fully in Vietnam.
The country finished a legal framework for e-commerce in 2006 with the Law on Electronic Transactions, decree on e-commerce and an amended commerce law. E-Commerce has entered a mature period in 2006 with the completion of an e-commerce policy and legal framework, as well as actions taken by enterprises and individuals with the support of state agencies.
Nguyen Thanh Hung, director of the Ministry of Trade's e-commerce department, said this signaled a new level of development in e-commerce stemming from the familiarity of e-commerce transactions both between customers and businesses, business-to-business and the provision of public administrative services via the internet.
The number of domestic enterprises conducting business-to-business (B2B) transactions increased in 2006 as did the number of enterprise with an online business presence.
The country's largest B2B site, Vietnam Business Portal developed by the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry, attracted the participation of 6,700 enterprises with 3,600 products. The number of enterprises increased by nearly 30 per cent against the previous year.
E-commerce propaganda and training in recent years has been intensified. Mass media has various methods of booting the development of e-commerce, educating the public of the requirements and participation methods. E-commerce training is booming, even free courses for enterprises. Basically, current short-term and long-term training methods meet the demand for e-commerce explorations by organisations and individuals in Vietnam. Universities and colleges nationwide are teaching e-commerce to their students. An academic survey in northern schools with economic or business administration departments showed that 75 per cent of school included e-commerce in their programmers.
The Ministry of Trade plans to provide digital signatures for exporters in early 2007, after a four-month trial in 2006, and to grant online certificates of origin to all exporters in Vietnam through the Vietnam e-Commerce Portal, until e-customs is available to support the service online.
E-commerce will be a must in the post-WTO era with stiffer competition in the ASEAN country, business circles predict.
However the real challenge, Hung pointed out, in boosting e-commerce is to change enterprises' awareness of the concept, while Commercial Counselor of the US Embassy in Vietnam suggested Vietnam pay attention to improving current infrastructure, especially with a faster and more reliable communication network.
Last but not least, language barriers are still an issue for e-commerce growth in Vietnam, where English profiency is not yet popular with the larger population, said Miguel Pardo de Zela, adding "If I were a young person in Vietnam, I will certainly spend a lot of time learning English, simply because it's the door to learning all that people want to learn".
The statistics from the Vietnam Internet Centre show that Vietnam now has 15 million internet users, expected to double in coming three years. A big market together with quick economic growth is a prerequisite for the strong development of e-commerce.
Followings are ideas of experts about this issue:
“E-commerce must be planned to develop synchronously,” Tran Thanh Hai, Vice Director of the Ministry of Trade's e-commerce department
Technical infrastructure needs to be improved such as by increasing the capacity of lines connecting to the outside world. The band width nowadays is still limited and accounting jobs and software transfer is not yet possible. An appropriate legal framework needs to be provided, including a more liberal and precise law on Internet. Other laws should be an e-commerce law according to the UNCITRAL law, e-banking etc.
Otherwise, IT and Internet-services training and confidence in business needs to be improved; as the current business environment in Vietnam is still very risky.
“E-commerce in Vietnam still has some problems,” Darrell Owen, Consultant to USAID
In Vietnam, B2B is much more important than B2C (in US: 90 per cent vs. 10 per cent). International" e-commerce is maybe more important than domestic, but also more difficult, since different legislation involved. ECommerce can be done, even if not all legislation is in place; for example the US enacted, a "Digital Signature Law" only within the last year but e-commerce has been conducted since long time. Government offices could start to operate via e-commerce, so that they experience the reality and can adjust policies.
“E-commerce training is very important”, Trinh Minh Tien, Director of the National Institute for Post and Telematics Strategy
Around 49 of 64 provinces and cities have developed websites and 80 per cent of them were upgraded. However, only 1 per cent in the institute's survey last year accessed the internet for e-commerce, while 17 per cent of them accessed online education. Issues involving security, e-commerce training and new regulations relating to electronic advertisement and consumer protection will be further developed this year.
Huong Ly
Vietnamese
