Many languages changed their writing systems to the Latin script. In some countries, Europeans made native people use it. The Vietnamese language was written in Chinese characters, and there is a Chinese-based Vietnamese writing system called chu nom. However, Chinese script requires a large number of characters to be learnt before a person is truly literate. The Vietnamese government switched to the Latin alphabet in the early 20th century so they could increase the country's literacy rates. The Vietnamese kept using the Latin alphabet even after independence since it was much faster to learn than Chinese characters (chu nom). 