Since the 2000s, Da Nang has made the kick-start on the development of e-government model, with four key pillars of digital transformation, namely policies, information infrastructure, advanced applications and human resources. Based on e-government, Da Nang is heading towards turning itself into a smart city in which data serves as the main foundation.

A burgeoning corner of Da Nang viewed above

Noticeably, Da Nang was the first city in Viet Nam to launch an e-government system in 2014, with the effective application of the ‘one-stop-shop’ mechanism, and software on managing government employees, and administrative dossiers.

In terms of water supply, for instance, the Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system has put into operation, proving highly practical in automatically monitoring water flow and pressure through sensors and giving timely warnings.

Besides, a combined total of about 1,800 government-funded surveillance cameras have been installed for the detection of traffic and security violations.

The e-government system aims to help the city government and State management agencies to enhance their operational efficiency, facilitate citizens and businesses to access information in all aspects in a quick, open, and transparent manner, thereby partly improve the lives of local people, and creating a sustainable business environment.

Da Nang has started its journey to becoming a smart city since 2018. A smart city strategy was developed in January 2018 with a focus on implementing the IT application into 16 priority aspects under six key pillars, namely smart governance, economy, environment, mobility, living, people, with each being important in its own way.

In late 2018, the municipal government gave the green light to the implementation of the ‘Building a Smart City’ project for the 2018 - 2025 period, with a vision towards 2030.

Under the project, the objectives, the roadmap and technologies applied in 53 key programmes and projects worth 2,200 billion VND in total, have been outlined by the municipal authorities.

In detail, over the 2019- 2020 period, focus is placed on developing smart infrastructure, platform and data. The cost for this stage is expected to reach 939 billion VND, of which 550 billion VND come from public-private partnership (PPP) investment, whilst 46 billion VND is invested by businesses.

As for the 2021 - 2025 stage, 1,191 billion VND will be spent on implementing smart applications, of which 700 billion VND is worth of PPP capital, 150 billion VND from ODA loans, and 36 billion VND from businesses.

The 2026 – 2030 stage will highlight the smartisation of IT technologies on the basis of outstanding results achieved during the 2021 - 2025 stage.

By 2030, the city will have completed the building of a smart city connected with the networks of smart cities in the country and in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) region.

Besides, the city will build a synchronous telecom infrastructure system along with regional and inter-regional core networks, and expand the 5G mobile service to cover the entire city and broadband connection to enterprises and households.

Other goals include upgrading the e-government platform; completing the Local Government Service Platform (LGSP); connecting with the National Government Service Platform (NGSP) for sharing data with ministries and central agencies; and putting into operation a data service portal to provide the municipal government’s information to the public and businesses.

Besides, the development of urban spatial data infrastructure, with a focus on the integration of data on urban planning, transportation and other aspects on geographic information system (GIS), is one of the principles of the smart city building ambition.

By TOAN VAN – Translated by A.T