LAOS
The Nation-May 2
The World Bank has approved an assistance project to help Laos upgrade its agricultural productivity and produce crops for commercial purposes.
The bank’s board of executive directors approved the Lao Agriculture Competitiveness Project last week as part of efforts to help the country increase agricultural productivity.
The US$25 million project will support 28,000 farming households in 224 rural villages to improve their yields and product quality, and to increase labor productivity and crop sales, according to a statement from the bank
The project also aims to expand access to high quality seeds, machinery and irrigation schemes in order to reduce transaction costs and enable higher returns for farmers
“Employing much of our workforce, agriculture is critical for our nation,” Phouangparisak Pravongviengkham, Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Forestry of Laos, was quoted as saying in the statement. “As outlined in the 8th National Socio-Economic Development Plan, Laos PDR has prioritised green growth in its long-term agriculture and forestry development strategy and it focuses on agricultural quality, safe food and products by having small and medium enterprises as the main engine for materializing the strategy. This project represents an important step in that effort”.
Laos’ agriculture sector is facing serious challenges in meeting the demands of international and domestic markets, due to issues such as farm productivity, produce quality, and profitability.
The project hopes to address these challenges by promoting best practices in farming, improving the quality of produce and reducing costs, linking farmers to agri-businesses to improve marketing, and shifting to more modern and environmentally-friendly processing facilities and technologies to improve the product value and reduce losses.
Strengthening the enabling environment will also help reduce costs of doing business in the agriculture sector
“Lao PDR is working to make its agricultural sector more productive, profitable, and green,” said Ellen Goldstein, World Bank director for Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos. “Farming families, agri-businesses, retailers, and everyday consumers will benefit from these efforts to improve the quality, availability and cost of fresh produce.
The project will contribute to the World Bank’s multi-sectoral approach toward tackling malnutrition by increasing the diversity of food for a more nutritious diet.”
Through diversified production, the project will combat stunting, which affects more than 40 percent of children under five in Laos.
The project will encourage farming communities to diversify their diets, improve cooking and processing of food, and reduce women’s time in farming through the use of modern machinery. Farmers will also use climate smart technologies to develop cleaner and higher value agricultural products.
