Department of Information and Communications of Nghe An province (population 3 million) in Vietnam has launched e-government portals for districts in the province, sharing all public administration procedures at the district and provincial level and integrates citizen service delivery.

According to Vietnam’s Ministry of Information and Communications , the Government seeks to improve management and administration in departments at the province and district level through IT application.

So far, 58 district portals have been established. The individual district portals are integrated under the Nghe An province portal . The portals were launched recently at a conference organised by the Department of Information and Communications.

At the conference, public officials raised some difficulties in the implementation process: difficulty in reviewing articles, too many administrative procedures and restrictions to updating the portals. Agencies which have a large number of visitors proposed maintaining both the integrated portal as well as their own independent website.

Ho Quang Thanh, Director of Information and Communications said, “Government units are required to maintain their own portals and developing human resource capacity to plan, manage and upgrade their portals. They are also responsible for providing the public with information and sharing administrative procedures online.”

The public agencies are to establish an editor responsible for content development and management. Each unit will be provided with an account to operate their portal. The Department will provide guidance to new units on account management and operation, and content management. It is also working with other government agencies to review information security and assess the functionality of the portals.

Ho has proposed the establishment of specialised agencies by the provincial and district governments to update the portals, by November this year. In the coming months, the Department will work to ensure all independent government websites are integrated under the Nghe An portal and complete remaining administrative procedures.