These are good and convenient ways for people, which are very encouraging. Because for a long time, to reflect an issue, people sometimes have to wait for a meeting with voters, a dialogue, go directly to functional agencies or find the right address to send petitions and recommendations.
Now with a smartphone, that distance can be significantly shortened. A degraded road section, a garbage collection point causing pollution, a broken lighting system, inadequate administrative procedures or a livelihood problem arising in a residential area can be quickly reflected.
But the most important thing about the model is not the QR code.
QR code, after all, is just a receiving tool. What people are more concerned about is where their opinions will go and how they will be processed after pressing the send button.
No matter how modern a receiving channel is, if feedback is sent and then falls into silence, it is very difficult to create trust. Therefore, along with expanding the channels of "listening to the people's voices", it is necessary to build a process to respond to people's opinions in a clear and transparent manner.
People need to know that their reflections have been received. The content under the authority of which agency must be transferred to the right place. Issues that can be resolved need a deadline for handling. Proposals that cannot be met also need to be clearly explained for reasons.
Of course, not every proposal from the people can be implemented immediately. Because there are recommendations that are entangled in legal regulations, resources limitations or actual conditions. But even in that case, a complete answer is still much better than silence.
Listening is not only creating conditions for people to speak. Listening is also to let speakers know that their opinions are respected.
And QR codes should not be seen as the only channel. Young people may be familiar with smartphones, but elderly people or people with limited digital skills still need traditional forms such as direct meetings, suggestion boxes, and contact in residential areas.
The best digital transformation is to help people have more choices, not to create a new barrier. If done well, models like in Hoa Trach or Dat Do will not only help the Front have an additional channel to collect information, but more importantly, these models can create a very specific process: People reflect, agencies receive, government handles, people are answered and the community can monitor the results.
Listening to the people" from QR codes, efficiency must be measured by the number of people's feedback and the number of issues from the grassroots level that are actually resolved, not by the number of code scans.
