Tourism is the industry that takes the lead in digital transformation in Cao Bang province. According to Ms. To Thi Trang, Deputy Director of the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism of Cao Bang province, "digital transformation is an inevitable and very important trend for the development of tourism in general and Cao Bang’s tourism in particular. Digital transformation makes interaction between state management agencies, businesses and tourists easier, while increasing the effectiveness of tourism promotion."

In the period of 2020 - 2023, the total number of tourists coming to Cao Bang reached over 4 million; Total revenue from sightseeing tickets, accommodation, and travel activities hit more than 2.4 trillion, total social income reached about 5.3 trillion VND. In 2022 alone, the number of tourists coming to Cao Bang will be over 1.1 million. By the end of December 2023, the number of visitors to Cao Bang during the year reached about 1.9 million.

One of the factors contributing to the revenue growth of the local tourism industry is digital transformation.

At present, the "picture" of digital transformation of tourism in Cao Bang province has many positive "highlights".

Typically, in April 2023, the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism announced the launch of Cao Bang’s smart tourism portal (Caobangtourism.vn) and CaoBang Tourism app on smartphones with popular utilities such as 360 virtual tourism, room booking, looking up information on restaurants, hotels, tourist attractions, etc., which help visitors save time and money.

“Currently, the Smart Tourism Portal of Cao Bang province has deployed virtual tourism and virtual explanations with 7 key tourist areas/destinations, including 3 special national relics (Bac Po relic area, Tran Hung Dao Forest; 1950 Border Victory Relic Site in Thach An District), and 4 national relics (Ban Gioc Waterfall Tourist Area, Muong Ngao Cave, Mountain God's Eye and Mr. Kim Dong's grave site). In addition to Vietnamese, the portal also has Chinese and English versions, with a simple design, easy to access, and easy to look up on computers and smartphones. Up to now, the portal has had about 3 million visits," Ms. Trang said.

The CaoBang Tourism app is designed with different fields, which is very convenient for tourists to use. It also has many symbols imbued with Cao Bang's cultural identity, urging tourists to visit and experience. There are currently nearly 200 accommodation locations included in the application. All tourist attractions as well as restaurants, motels, and food stores in the app had been carefully surveyed to ensure standards.

"Tourists responded that the CaoBang Tourism application is very convenient for them as well as travel agencies in visiting tourist areas/destinations in Cao Bang province," Ms. Trang added.

Overcoming difficulties to increase the efficiency of tourism digital conversion

The report on the results of implementing digital transformation activities in the tourism sector in Cao Bang province in 2023 of the Digital Transformation Steering Committee under the Cao Bang Provincial People's Committee said that: Cao Bang province has implemented timely and effectively tourism digital transformation activities under the direction and guidance of the Government, the Prime Minister, the National Digital Transformation Committee, the Ministry of Information and Communications, the Ministry of Culture and Sports and Tourism. The initial results are remarkable and are the basis for implementing tasks in the future.

However, tourism digital transformation activities in Cao Bang still have many difficulties and obstacles. Specifically, human resources for digital transformation, especially high-quality human resources for tourism digital transformation, are lacking and do not meet the requirements for performing assigned tasks; Lack of infrastructure, lack of funding to implement tourism digital transformation projects and tasks; Digitized tourism data is still limited, much data has not been created, standardized, or digitized to serve searching and sharing...

To improve the efficiency of digital transformation in Cao Bang tourism in the coming time, the Digital Transformation Steering Committee proposed that the Ministry of Information and Communications prioritize the use of Public-Utility Telecommunications Fund capital to support telecommunications businesses in Cao Bang province to invest in telecommunications infrastructure to provide broadband mobile coverage in 2024 and 2025 for 169 villages and hamlets that do not have mobile signals to promote the development of digital society in general and tourism development in particular.

The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism needs to review, edit and supplement tourism development plans and strategies in accordance with the mission requirements of digital transformation; develop a number of basic digital platforms for the tourism industry from central to grassroots levels to serve state management, communication and tourism promotion on digital platforms... for localities to apply and use in a unified manner.