The Asian Development Bank (ADB) will grant 20 million USD toward helping Laos protect its rich and diverse natural resources, as commercial agriculture and forestry developments in the country continue to expand.
An agreement on a Sustainable Natural Resource Management and Productivity Enhancement project was signed in Vientiane on Mar. 23 by ADB Country Director Gil-Hong Kim and Lao Deputy Minister of Finance Viengthong Siphandone. The bank’s Board of Directors approved the grant for the project last month.
Commercial investment in the natural resource sector has significantly increase over the past few years, and as a result, there was high demand to ensure that development is economically, socially, and environmentally sustainable, ADB country director Kim said at the signing ceremony.
The project is one of the more important development projects in the country, as it is connected to the government’s efforts to reduce poverty in the southern provinces, Deputy Minister Viengthong Siphandone said.
The government also considered an increase in agricultural productivity as a priority to ensure a secure food supply for the Lao people, as well as produce surplus crops for export, she said. Adding that this will help create new jobs and improve incomes, one of the primary conditions for the country’s removal from the list of least developed nations by 2020.
The project will be implemented in the provinces of Savannakhet, Xekong, Champassak and Attapeu. It will increase the capacity and capability of oversight agencies to sustainably manage natural resources, which will help in both protecting the environment and supporting the government’s push for rural opportunity./.