Untangling the economic bottlenecks of Vietnamese press and media in the context of digital economic development

The workshop is part of the annual event of the Vietnamese press community called the Third June Press Forum (2024), co-chaired by Information and Communication Magazine, Vietnamnet Electronic Newspaper (Ministry of Information and Communications) and the Institute of Journalism and Communication (University of Social Sciences and Humanities). Currently, the country has 6 main multimedia press agencies, 127 newspapers, 670 magazines; 72 radio and television agencies. Although different in type, most press agencies are experiencing a decline in revenue, especially television stations and press agencies that are completely financially autonomous. Speaking at the opening of the workshop, Deputy Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Huy Dung said that the revenue of newspapers and magazines in the first 9 months of 2023 decreased by 9.4% compared to the same period in 2022; and the total revenue in 2023 of radio and television stations decreased by 23% compared to 2022. In addition, press agencies are facing the risk of a sharp decline in revenue, in the context that social networking platforms such as Facebook or Google have taken away about 70% of advertising revenue of mainstream press... Meanwhile, currently, annual regular expenditure on the press is less than 0.5% of the total regular expenditure of the State budget; expenditure on press investment is also low, accounting for only about 0.25% of the total investment expenditure of the State budget.
The Deputy Minister of Information and Communications hopes that agencies, speakers, scientists, and leaders of press agencies will contribute objective and comprehensive opinions on all aspects related to the current press and media economy. Thereby, proposing and recommending to the press steering agency, the state press management agency, the governing agency, the press agency and the competent authority solutions to remove the "bottlenecks" related to the press and media economy. Associate Professor, Dr. Dang Thi Thu Huong - Vice Rector of the University of Social Sciences and Humanities, VNU, said that in the context of globalization and digital transformation, competition between press and media agencies to attract the public and advertisers is becoming increasingly fierce. The emergence and widespread spread of digital platforms (such as Facebook, Google and Apple) along with the incredible breakthrough potential of information technology are challenging traditional business models, which have brought success to press agencies for decades.
In the context of the low and decreasing proportion of the State budget allocated to press agencies, the program production cooperation activities of radio and television stations have significantly narrowed in terms of the number of partners and programs, and advertising revenue has declined.
In early 2023, the Prime Minister signed Decision No. 348/QD-TTg approving the Strategy "Digital transformation of journalism to 2025, with a vision to 2030", with specific goals: by 2030, 100% of press agencies will put content on digital platforms (prioritizing domestic digital platforms), press agencies will optimize revenue sources, of which 50% of press agencies will increase revenue by at least 20%.
Associate Professor, Dr. Dang Thi Thu Huong emphasized: "The press and media economy in the context of digital economic development is posing many opportunities and challenges for the Vietnamese press to develop strongly, at the same time, it is necessary to maintain the goal of building press agencies in a professional, humane, and modern direction; fulfilling the mission of information and propaganda to serve the revolutionary cause of the Party and the cause of national innovation". Providing an overview of the revenue of press agencies, Mr. Le Quoc Minh - Member of the Party Central Committee, Chairman of the Vietnam Journalists Association, Editor-in-Chief of Nhan Dan Newspaper shared that the revenue structure of press agencies has changed. So, besides traditional advertising and readers, which source of revenue is the most important in 2022 compared to 2023?
There are many different forms in the revenue structure of press agencies today. In which, event organization is a form of business being implemented by press agencies, revenue from event organization can account for 20% of total revenue in some press agencies. Advertising is an important source of revenue, but it has now decreased from about 90% to 40-50% of the revenue of press agencies due to the dominance of other electronic press services. In addition, there are new forms of revenue such as e-commerce, brand licensing is a new form of business for the world press; providing information technology services; reproducing published content, or becoming a retailer of publications, specific products...
Press and media economy and bottlenecks
What are the bottlenecks of the current press economy? Answering this question, Associate Professor, Dr. Bui Chi Trung - shared the bottlenecks in the development of the press and media economy, including: bottlenecks in awareness, in development goals; bottlenecks between the technical and technological explosion, between "supply - demand"; bottlenecks in motivation and benefits, in building the overall system structure of the press and media economy and management institutions.
Associate Professor, Dr. Bui Chi Trung suggested: How can the press still maintain its principles and purposes but still have a source of revenue for reproduction and investment? Is it necessary to maintain a horizontal system according to each administrative locality, according to each industry and field?
The speaker emphasized that solving the problem of press and media economy must be associated with the arrangement of the national press system. The development of press and media economy does not only need to be viewed from the perspective of a few specific cases, from a single field or separate type, but needs to be viewed on the overall, strategic and comprehensive scale of the national press system, associated with the context of strong digital economic development today. From there, there will be a breakthrough development to well perform the role and function of revolutionary press, of the professional and humane Vietnamese media system.