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Laos PDR
History of Organic Agriculture Organic Production Domestic Markets Regulation and Certification Government policies and programmes Latest News Further Readings Links References

History of Organic Agriculture

Like in many other developing countries, the development of Laos organic agriculture has been promoted by either rural development NGOs and by private sectors interested to gain access to premium markets. Also, the Laos government has been involved in the sector development since the early stage.

Almost all NGOs in Laos are foreign NGOs having office and development projects in the country. These foreign NGOs introduced the concept of sustainable agriculture and organic farming to Laos since late 1990s. Sustainable farming technologies and practices have been incorporated into various training activities of public agencies like the National Agriculture and Forestry Extension Services (NAFES) as well as NGOs own activities, reaching out thousands of farmers throughout the country. As most of the NGOs programme at that time did not support market linkage, the products from these sustainable farms were all sold as conventional products with only few were sold as natural products or pesticide-free products with slight premium prices.

It is not until mid 2000s that organic farming with market linkage became an important agenda among Lao agriculture authorities and NGOs as many international development institutions and donor agencies realized the potential opportunities of organic agriculture as poverty eradication. The collaborative project between HELVETAS and the Department of Agriculture launched a project for the promotion of organic farming and marketing in Lao PDR (PROFIL) in 2004 made a major milestone of Lao organic farming history.

Organic Production
As large parts of Lao agriculture are still under subsistent production, there possibly exist “organic by default” farms in many areas around the country. Also, there are several wild products collected from forest or fallow land which are consumed by local farmers and some are sold for cash income. If better organized, these wild produces can be certified and sold as organic products. PROFIL (2005) identified several wild products which have potential marketability, e.g. bamboo shoot, banana inflorescence, "Posa" (Broussonetia papyrifera), Cardamom (Amomum sp.), "Mak kha" (Pahudia cochinchinensis), and rattan.

For commercial agriculture crops, there are few organic projects in Laos that received organic certification and some more are in the pipeline. The main organic products are coffee, rice and vegetables (the vegetables currently for local market only). There is an attempt by PROFIL to investigate the possibility of organic vegetable production for export, especially from Boloven Plateau, Champasak province in southern Lao PDR (Sipaseuth, K.; Sommany. P.; Bouasipaseuth, V.; and Wilson, A.; 2008). From the report, it appears that this is still in a very early stage of development and no organic vegetables are expected in the near future.

Based on information collected by a workshop organized by PROFIL at the end of 2007 (Panyakul, 2007) as well as more recent updated news, there are less than commercial organic productions either already certified as well as those in the pipeline, totalling around 1,000 families in 2,000 ha.

Domestic Markets
Domestic organic market in Laos appears to be growing rapidly. Since December 2006 when the first organic farmer market was organized by PROFIL at Wat Thatluang, the market expands significantly both in term of number of farmers participated, range of products, market frequency, and sale volume. At the beginning, the market was organized once a month and later on became weekly event. The average sale has risen to around 24.758 million kip per week of which around 2.49 tons of vegetables and rice are sold weekly (PROFIL 2008 – interview). And around 111 organic farmers, mainly vegetables producers around Vientiane city, are participating in this market. According to a survery, domestic consumers appear to have low aware about organic agriculture but was confident about the integrity of organic products sold at the weekend market. With the success, from next year onward, the organic farmers plan to have additional sale in the middle of the week, making the market to occur twice a week.

Regulation and Certification
In collaboration with the DOA, PROFIL had developed national organic standards since 2004 based on IFOAM Basic Standards. The standards, covering organic crops production and wild harvest, were approved by the MAF on December 2005. PROFIL also assist the DOA to develop a national organic seal, to be used for organic products certified against DOA’s organic standards. The seal, owned by the DOA, was registered with the Science Technology Environment Agency. From 2005, the DOA had began developing local certification body, focusing especially on grow group certification (with internal control system). But it was not until early 2008 that the Laos Certification Body (LCB) was established by the DOA, under the CADC. At present the LCB has not yet offering its certification services as it still embarks on competency development. Also, no seal is used with any products at the moment as the DOA is still developing the policy and procedures on seal use. Besides putting efforts to operationalize the LCB, the DOA also are considering how to set up a regulatory framework for organic and safe food production, under the broad term of “clean agriculture”. The framework would include the approval of certification body (with possibly requirement for accreditation).

Currently, only a handful of foreign organic certification bodies offer services in Laos, all have their base in Thailand. These include Organic Agriculture Certification Thailand – ACT (Thailand), BCS (Germany), ICEA (Italy) and Bioagricert (Italy).

In early 2008, the LCB entered into an Asian region certification collaborative platform together with other 8 Asian organic certification bodies, known as Certification Alliance. This regional collaborative platform allows members to offer multiple organic certifications with integrated inspection as well as market support and institutional development.

Government policies and programmes
In 2006, The MIC, in cooperation with ITC, has initiated a national export strategy plan. The strategic plan for agricultural sector aims “to develop organic agriculture in Lao in order to generate employment opportunities for youth, particularly women, among the multi-ethnic group in rural and remote areas and improve the well-being of farmers and environment protection …” (MOIC 2006). The strategy plan was approved by the Minister of Industry and Commerce in mid 2008 and it is expected to be approved by the cabinet in December 2008 (Phommabouth 2008 – interview). Key interventions of this strategy plan are (MIC 2006):

Development of organic supply capacity through extension services, provision of loan
Business and entrepreneurship development through training and information dissemination among the existing operators as well as potential operators
Development of certification system
Competency development to improve “social capital” especially on human resource, extension, research and development, and training

Besides putting efforts to operationalize the LCB, the DOA also are considering how to set up a regulatory framework for organic and safe food production, under the broad term of “clean agriculture”. The framework would include the approval of certification body (with possibly requirement for accreditation).