Hanoi (VNA) – Vietnam has beenrecording strong development in e-commerce, through which businesses will havemore chances to promote export, an official said at a workshop in Hanoi onOctober 18.

Dang Hoang Hai, Director of the E-commerce andDigital Economy Agency (IDEA) under the Ministry of Industry and Trade, saidVietnam is said to be one of the fastest growing e-commerce markets inSoutheast Asia. Besides, a big population of over 90 million with highpercentages of young people and internet users is a basis for the country’se-commerce market to keep expanding in the future.

He cited his agency’s statistics as showing thatthe growth rate of business-to-consumer (B2C) retail sales via e-commercesoared by 30 percent in 2018. With such a continually high growth rate since2015, Vietnam is confident that the B2C retail e-commerce sales will reach thetarget of 10 billion USD in 2020.

The legal framework on e-commerce is nowrelatively complete, Hai said, adding that with the mushrooming of e-commerceplatforms and accompanied services, e-commerce is becoming a useful tool forbusinesses to capitalise on chances to make breakthroughs in development,giving them more opportunities to boost export.

However, the official also admitted thate-commerce requires the synchronous development of infrastructure as well asbusinesses and people’s awareness. Meanwhile, most of Vietnamese firms now aresmall- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) with limited financial capacity andhuman resources.

Giving participants an overview of e-commerce inVietnam, Nguyen Thi Thu Trang, a specialist from IDEA, said e-commercetransactions have been on the rise. 

There were nearly 40 million people shoppingonline in the country in 2018. Although revenue in this sector was rather big,it accounted for only 4.2 percent of the total retail sales of goods andservices last year.

She also pointed to an increase in transactionsvia mobile phones, noting that about 92 percent of internet users have usedmobile phones to access the internet, and 81 percent of the online shoppershave placed orders via mobile phones.

However, Trang said, only 44 percent of allbusinesses have used e-commerce, and 13 percent of them have created mobileapps.

She said like e-commerce, export has beenplaying an increasingly important role in Vietnam’s economy. 

More than 32 percent of Vietnamese SMEs have setup business relations with foreign partners via online channels, andbusiness-to-business e-commerce platforms will help local exporters to directlyaccess their clients and markets around the world in a swift and economicalmanner, she added./.