Vietnam’s digital economy is leading the way in the region

Vietnam's digital economy, along with Indonesia, is leading in growth in Southeast Asia with an average of 38%/year compared to 33%/year for the whole region since 2015 until now.

In general, time spent shopping online tends to increase under the impact of COVID-19. PwC's December 2021 report shows that in Vietnam the percentage of people shopping in stores will decrease from 76% in 2019 to 67% by the end of 2021, while shopping via mobile devices and smart phones increased from 55% to 69%. It can be affirmed that COVID-19 has had a profound impact on consumer behavior when switching from offline to online shopping. This trend promises to be maintained in the "new normal" period when consumers' online shopping behavior has become a habit and gradually replaces other traditional forms of purchase.

It can be seen that, although COVID-19 causes some economic difficulties, especially in freight transportation, it also contributes to changing consumers' online shopping behavior. This change is the development potential of the e-commerce market.

According to the Vietnam E-commerce White Paper in 2021, the average number of goods/services in each customer's online order from 2019 to now has increased significantly. Specifically, the proportion of buyers of 10 to 15 products and 15 or more products increased impressively in 2020. Detailed parameters show that the percentage of people who bought 10 to 15 products increased from 14% in 2019. to 24% by the end of 2020. The percentage of buyers on 15 products also increased from 18% in 2019 to 29% in 2020.

Spending on online shopping shows a similar trend. While the percentage of consumers spending less than 1 million VND for online shopping has decreased significantly (from 26% in 2019 to only 16% in 2020), the percentage of consumers shopping between 1 and 3 million VND, 3-5 million VND and over 5 million VND recorded a high increase.

That is the information given at the Workshop "Developing new business models in the process of industrialization and modernization to 2030, with a vision to 2045" organized by the Central Economic Commission on 11/03/13. 11. The symposium belongs to the framework of the third Industry Summit 4.0 - Industry Summit 4.0 with the theme "Promoting industrialization and modernization of the country in the digital era".

Speaking at the seminar, Deputy Head of the Central Economic Commission Nguyen Thanh Phong said that the fourth industrial revolution opens up many opportunities and poses many challenges for each country. organizations and individuals; has been increasingly strongly affecting all areas of economic and social life of the country.

The Politburo issued Resolution No. 52-NQ/TW dated September 27, 2019 on a number of guidelines and policies to actively participate in the Fourth Industrial Revolution, the Government issued Resolution 50/NQ-CP on the program In the course of the Government's action to implement Resolution No. 52-NQ/TW dated September 27, 2019 of the Politburo, the Prime Minister issued the Directive on improving the capacity to approach the Fourth Industrial Revolution and approved approve the project to promote the sharing economy model.

According to Mr. Nguyen Thanh Phong, the National Digital Transformation Program to 2025, with orientation to 2030, has identified the goal that Vietnam belongs to the group of 50 leading countries in e-government, by 2025 the digital economy will account for 20%. GDP; the proportion of the digital economy in each industry or field reaches at least 10%; by 2030, the digital economy will account for 30% of GDP; the proportion of digital economy in each industry, field reaches at least 20%...

According to the report "Southeast Asian Digital Economy 2019" published by Google, Temasek and Bain on October 3, 2019, Vietnam's digital economy in 2019 was worth 12 billion USD (contributing 5% of national GDP). in 2019), which is four times higher than the value of 2015 and is expected to reach 43 billion USD by 2025.

At the seminar, domestic and foreign experts exchanged and clarified issues of digital economy development, international experiences in taking advantage of technology platforms for digital transformation in the service and financial industries. , Bank; real estate; technology car call; digital content services and competition with cross-border digital platforms… to promote the post-COVID-19 recovery in the process of industrialization and modernization of the country. The delegates discussed more deeply about changing, developing new business models to adapt to new consumption trends from production to distribution, transportation, consumption and proposed the best solutions to help their business development in the new situation.

The leader of FPT Online Services Joint Stock Company shared that thanks to digital transformation, the Sendo e-commerce floor (under FPT) has optimized the selling costs of businesses by 30% compared to the traditional channel. The company also provides free support to open and sell businesses on Sendo and guides on how to operate on e-commerce, applying AI technology to optimize sales.

5/10 e-commerce platforms with the highest average traffic in 2020 in Southeast Asia are Vietnamese businesses.E-commerce portal iPrice in collaboration with SimilarWeb, AppsFlyer published a report on the impact of the pandemic on Vietnam's e-commerce industry in 2020. In which, the top 10 e-commerce platforms have average website traffic. The highest average of the past year in Southeast Asia recorded 5 domestic enterprises in Vietnam including The Gioi Di Dong, Tiki, Sendo, Bach Hoa Xanh and FPT Shop.

The remaining five representatives on the list include two "big" Shopee, Lazada and three Indonesian "unicorn" startups, Tokopedia, Bukalapak and Blibli. However, the difference in visits of the top 3 leading companies compared to the rest (including 5 Vietnamese enterprises) is still quite high.

In addition, under the impact of COVID-19, the online grocery industry also recorded an increase of nearly 9 times the number of searches for the fresh food category (vegetables, fruits, meat, seafood) compared to 2020.

The increase in the number of searches for these two categories shows a clear impact of COVID-19 on the shopping needs of Vietnamese consumers on e-commerce platforms.

According to the Vietnam E-commerce White Paper 2021, when asked about the criteria of interest when shopping online, 70% of consumers choose the top factor as the reputation of the e-commerce website/application; 41% will be attracted by promotions; 40% choose because of preferential shipping policies and 39% care about the price compared to buying at the store.

The Gioi Di Dong holds the 5th position in Southeast Asian e-commerce websites with an average annual visit of 28.6 million, just 7 million from Bukalapak. If counting the domestic market alone, The Gioi Di Dong is the domestic business in the second position throughout 2020.

Located in 6th place, Tiki surpassed Blibli to become the bright spot of Vietnamese businesses with 22.5 million visits in the average regional visitor ranking. Followed by Sendo with 14.3 million visits and ranked 8th. In the report of the second quarter of 2019, all Vietnamese enterprises are at the bottom of the list. Thus, 2020 has witnessed a marked improvement of Vietnamese exchanges.

At the same time, the "Southeast Asia E-Commerce Map" also recorded that Vietnam is the second largest market in the region after Indonesia, in terms of traffic volume. Accordingly, the average total website visits in 2020 of Vietnam is 4 times higher than that of Malaysia, 3 times that of the Philippines and 2 times of Thailand.

By Hanh Tran

References

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2. Vien Thong, 17/03/2021. VN Express, Urban Green.Viet Nam ap dao top 10 san thuong mai dien tu Dong Nam A. Retrieved from https://vnexpress.net/viet-nam-ap-dao-top-10-san-thuong-mai-dien-tu-dong-nam-a-4249498.html

3. Huyen Pham,7/3/2022. The gioi tiep thi. Manh tay chi tien mua hang thuong mai dien tu. Retrieved from https://thegioitiepthi.vn/manh-tay-chi-tien-mua-hang-thuong-mai-dien-tu-2022030708424261.htm