A man accesses online public services at Hà Nội’s Hoàn Kiếm District’s People’s Committee. Photo kinhtedothi.vn

HÀ NỘI — The Ministry of Finance maintained top position on the e-government development list for 2018, which was announced on Thursday. 

The report evaluated the performance of ministries, branches and localities in switching over to e-government. It was conducted by the Ministry of Information and Communication and the Việt Nam Digital Communications Association.

The report includes categories for ministries, governmental agencies and centrally-run cities and provinces. It is based on their use of information technology in the last three months of 2018 to improve their websites.

The Ministry of Industry and Trade jumped to second position, while the Ministry of Information and Communications was next. These two ministries have made significant progress, rising from 17th and 7th on the 2018 list.

Việt Nam Social Security was the top ranked governmental agency, followed by the Vietnam News Agency and Việt Nam Television.

The report concluded that the Vietnam News Agency and Việt Nam Television have made significant investments in information technology infrastructure.

The central province of Đà Nẵng topped the list of centrally-run provinces and cities. Thừa Thiên – Huế ranked second, down from first in 2017.

Ninh Bình, Hậu Giang, Nam Định and Quảng Nam were among provinces that showed great progress.

Đỗ Thanh Huyền, expert on public administration policy for the United Nations Development Programme in Việt Nam, said the number of internet users in Việt Nam has increased rapidly and State agencies are offering more administrative services online.

The number of people using the websites of government agencies to carry out administrative procedures has increased slightly over the years. However, the dissemination of e-government services remained limited.

Huyền said agencies and units needed to strengthen the dissemination of the Government's online public services. They also needed to share information on policies, procedures and forms to improve interactions between agencies and the public.

Nguyễn Quang Đồng, director of the Institute for Policy Research and Communication Development under the Vietnam Digital Media Association, said e-government was useful to provide public services online and foster the exchange of information between agencies and people. — VNS