Gov’t commits more resources into development zones

Gov’t commits more resources into development zones

The government has committed to pump more resources into 64 development focus zones across the country to catalyse rural development and poverty reduction efforts.

Minister of Planning and Investment DrSouphanhKeomixay told the ongoing National Assembly session on Tuesday that a huge capital allocation had been made to finance infrastructure development projects relating to the zones.
“These included roads, irrigation, water supply, schools, healthcare services and electricity. All these projects are critical for facilitating rural development and poverty reduction of local people,” DrSouphanh said.
Last year, the government dedicated 1,868 billion kip to the development of 64 development focus areas under the supervision of the government.
Of the total figure of 1,868 billion kip, some 191 billion kip was sourced from the national budget.
The remainder comes via various forms of assistance of foreign countries (551.2 billion kip), a loan from Nayoby bank (1,083.5 billion kip) and the Village Development Fund (41.9 billion kip).
DrSouphanh confirmed that the infrastructure development was aimed at promoting commercial production by local people and expedite village development so that big villages could be transformed into small towns in rural areas in line with national policy.
Experts agreed that infrastructure development is vital for Laos if it wants to speed up rural development and poverty reduction because once roads are paved, people would seek to move to build houses or building and live along the roads to commence business operation.
One of the most important features to note is that local villages are still struggling to access to funding which make it difficult for them to expand their commercial production and generate income and support livelihoods.
According to the government report recently, the number of poor families declined from 6.5 percent in 2015 to 6.3 percent in 2016. Nevertheless the target approved by the National Assembly was to lower the poverty rate to 6.111 percent.
The government attributed the slower decline in the poverty rate to the relative slowdown in the economic growth rate last year as well as challenges of providing facilities to the poor due to lack of road access.
Many people still live in remote and hard-to-access locations with mountainous topography which poses challenges for them to produce and transport to market.
The government acknowledged that Laos has seen high levels of investment in resource sectors but such had not created as many jobs as expected for local people.
It’s challenging for the government to create more job opportunity for local people, ensuring so younger people are employed and rely too much on their parents’ income.
Many people who moved above poverty line in previous years have been forced into poverty again after suffering from natural disasters such as flooding.

This year, the government aimed to reduce the poverty rate of families down to 6.09 percent and pumped more resources to the development focus areas for rural development and poverty reduction.

vientiane times