Hanoi (VNA) - The COVID-19 pandemic has posed bigchallenges for almost all industries and fields, with tourism among thosesuffering the heaviest. At the same time, due to the impact of theFourth Industrial Revolution, with changes in consumer habits, especially afterthe COVID-19 outbreak, digital transformation has become an indispensablerequirement of the industry.

The transformation of Vietnam'stourism is said to have many barriers due to the uneven qualityof workers, low management capacity, and limited digitaltechnology.

In the coming time, in order to remove those barriers, the industrymust carry out effective solutions and overcome limitations in terms offinance, human resources, policies, information technology, organisation andmanagement, and cooperation mechanisms.

According to Dr. Le Thi Ai Nhan, a social science expert,the top requirement of digital transformation and development of tourism is tohave good human resources, as well as a large number of competent experts in information technology. However, the currenttraining system in Vietnam is still quite inadequate in catching up with thetrend of talent incubation and human resources development in digital tourism.

Most of restaurants, hotels, travel agents, travel shops, andtourist sites in the country have not been manned with those professionalisedin digital tourism to serve the requirements of digital transformation and theneeds of tourists.

Another problem is differences in digital technology betweenregions across the country. The areas having good conditions for digitaltransformation in the tourism industry are mostly in large citiesand provinces.

Experts say that Vietnam can learn from internationalexperience in building planning, synchronously developing informationinfrastructure, the Internet of Things, and artificial intelligence in a professional and modern direction, associated with the tourismproduct value chain. In addition, Vietnam should focus on developing smartcities along with tourism digital transformation infrastructure.

It is necessary to have more mechanisms and policies toencourage and promote the participation of stakeholders in the tourism digitaltransformation strategy, and expand international cooperation in this field./.