Son La province identifies production associated with product consumption as one of the province's priorities.
especially to increase promotion, product consumption, and develop e-commerce

Promoting digital economy

Son La is a locality with strengths in agricultural production. Currently, the province has the largest fruit growing area in the North with 84,000 hectares of various fruit trees, with an output of about 455 thousand tons/year. Most of the fruit growing areas in the province are managed by cooperatives, with members being ethnic minorities.

According to the Son La Province Cooperative Union, the province currently has 838 agricultural service cooperatives. With the province's support policies, in recent years, cooperatives in Son La have actively applied science and technology to production, transforming the district's agricultural production from fragmented and small-scale to high-tech applications, according to VietGAP standards. To date, Son La province has more than 200 cooperatives applying high technology, creating sustainable agricultural, forestry and fishery chains.

Mr. Le Tien Loi, Chairman of the Son La Province Cooperative Union, said that the province has identified production associated with product consumption as one of the province's priorities, especially promoting and consuming products and developing e-commerce. Therefore, in recent times, the province has implemented many mechanisms and policies to support cooperatives in enhancing the application of IT to proactively participate in the digital economy.

According to Report No. 170/BC-BDT dated June 7, 2024 of the Son La Provincial Ethnic Committee, implementing the State management work in the field of ethnic affairs, currently 98% of the documents issued by the Ethnic Committee use digital signatures and digital certificates in electronic transactions; regularly maintain the anti-malware software system according to the centralized management model. The Ethnic Committee coordinates with the Ethnic Committee to deploy Content 1 - Sub-project 2 of Project 10 on digital transformation in implementing the National Target Program 1719.

From 2022, Son La province's cooperatives will continue to receive support from the National Target Program on Socio-Economic Development for Ethnic Minority and Mountainous Areas for the 2021-2030 period; Phase I: 2021-2025 under Decision No. 1719/QD-TTg (National Target Program 1719). Most recently (October 2023), about 200 ethnic minority members who are key leaders of cooperatives in the province were trained to improve their digital transformation capacity.

Strengthening support for ethnic minority areas

In the process of digital transformation, the ethnic work sector is prioritized by Son La province, with many separate projects to implement. Since 2019, the People's Committee of Son La province has issued Plan No. 230/KH-UBND to implement the Project "Strengthening the application of IT to support ethnic minorities in socio-economic development and ensuring security and order in ethnic minority areas of Son La province in the period of 2019 - 2025" (referred to as Plan 230).

According to Mr. Luong Van Toan, Deputy Head of the Ethnic Minorities Committee of Son La province, implementing Plan 230, the Provincial Ethnic Minorities Committee is assigned to preside over and coordinate with relevant units to establish support points for ethnic minorities to apply IT to develop the economy and ensure security and order; build IT applications for ethnic minorities in the medical field to support remote diagnosis, examination and treatment; build IT applications for ethnic minorities in supporting natural disaster warnings and natural disasters; create an IT application system to propagate and support ethnic policies;...

“To serve the State management of ethnic affairs from the province to the local level according to Plan 230, the province has also invested in upgrading and building information systems, databases and IT applications to share and exchange data on ethnic affairs. At the same time, training, propaganda, dissemination and raising awareness of IT applications for ethnic minorities and cadres working on ethnic affairs in the area,” said Mr. Toan.

From 2022 to present, the National Target Program 1719 has provided additional resources for Son La province to strengthen the application of IT in the field of ethnic affairs, implement ethnic policies and support ethnic minorities in socio-economic development, ensuring security and order in ethnic minority areas of the province. In 2024 alone, according to Plan No. 67/KH-UBND, dated March 4, 2024 of the Provincial People's Committee, Son La will allocate 48,537 billion VND to implement Project 10 of the National Target Program 1719; including Sub-Project 2: "Application of IT to support socio-economic development and ensure security and order in ethnic minority and mountainous areas".

Khanh Thi