HCM City (VNS/VNA) - The fourth Industrial Revolution’s technologies helpimprove manufacturing efficiency and competitiveness, but not many firms, withtheir limited resources, can afford them, experts have said.

Do PhuocTong, Chairman of the HCM City Association of Mechanical – ElectricalEnterprises (HAMEE), said: “New machinery and technologies today arealways integrated solutions that enable managers to know the current status ofthe manufacturing process, how the machine is operating and in what mode, andso on. This helps boost efficiency and reduce errors in the productionprocess.”

Hetold Vietnam News: “Investing in the fourth Industrial Revolution’stechnology requires a large amount of money. Many Vietnamese firms in the mechanicalengineering sector want to invest in new technologies but their limitedresources prevent them.”

Manybusinesses also have difficulty in finding human resources who understand andcould use new technologies, according to Tong.

Manyforeign companies have shifted their production to Vietnam, and a number oflocal and foreign companies have expanded production, increasing demand forhuman resources.

“But thehuman resources in society cannot be suddenly increased. So training andretaining human resources is currently a very tough problem for businesses inthe mechanical engineering industry.”

Pham XuanDa, head of the Ministry of Science and Technology’s southern affairs, saidmanufacturing was the backbone of the economy.

“Thoughthe [Government’s] preferential and support policies have not met theexpectations of the mechanical engineering industry, it has achieved remarkableresults such as expanding rapidly in terms of numbers from around 10,000 in2010 to more than 21,000 enterprises in 2016, and increasing exports to over 16billion USD.”

“Localenterprises can make some products that we previously had to import. Productionlines in factories are synchronised, and enterprises have developed a number oftechnologies.”

Localfirms also successfully developed many kinds of machinery, equipment andproduction lines for the agricultural sector, including for animal feedproduction and cassava starch processing, he said.

But theindustry faced many shortcomings, including low competitiveness, shortage ofraw material supply and qualified human resources and lack of linkages betweencompanies, he said.

Accordingto experts, in the context of integration and the fourth industrial revolution,new requirements have emerged for the mechanical industry, requiring them tomake more efforts to improve their competitiveness and they need supportivepolicies from the Government.

Tong said:“There is no policy to support enterprises investing in reforming theirmanagement system.

“For along time the Government has had policies to support enterprises investing inupgrading machinery and equipment to improve production capacity.”

"Butif an enterprise has good equipment but not good management, it would be hardto fully exploit the equipment," he explained.

“Therefore,we want the Government to offer enterprises stronger support in the area ofmanagement.”

He saidrelevant agencies should do research to come up with solutions to help firmsinstall a management system at reasonable cost or subsidise it.

Havingadvanced management systems comparable with international standards would helpimprove the competitiveness of Vietnamese firms, he said.

Tong, whois also chairman of Duy Khanh Engineering Co.,Ltd, said his company was lookingfor solutions to enable an administrator to control production capacity andprocesses to optimise the manufacturing process, improve production efficiencyand better meet customer requirements.

It hadworked with a software company to develop a system for controlling thecompany’s activities from operating machines to taking orders, he said.

“This ...is essential for businesses in the mechanical engineering industry. With bettermanagement capacity, enterprises will better meet customers’ demands andcustomers will have more trust in [such] businesses.”/.