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1994-05-02
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<text>
<title>
Laos: Economy
</title>
<article><hdr>The World Factbook 1993: Laos
Economy</hdr><body>
<p>Overview: One of the world's poorest nations, Laos has had a
Communist centrally planned economy with government ownership and
control of productive enterprises of any size. In recent years,
however, the government has been decentralizing control and
encouraging private enterprise. Laos is a landlocked country with a
primitive infrastructure; that is, it has no railroads, a rudimentary
road system, limited external and internal telecommunications, and
electricity available in only a limited area. Subsistence
agriculture is the main occupation, accounting for over 60% of GDP
and providing about 85-90% of total employment. The predominant crop
is rice. For the foreseeable future the economy will continue to
depend for its survival on foreign aid from the IMF and other
international sources; aid from the former USSR and Eastern Europe
has been cut sharply.
</p>
<p>National product: GDP - exchange rate conversion - $900 million
(1991)
</p>
<p>National product real growth rate: 4% (1991)
</p>
<p>National product per capita: $200 (1991)
</p>
<p>Inflation rate (consumer prices): 10% (1991)
</p>
<p>Unemployment rate: 21% (1989 est.)
</p>
<p>Budget: revenues $83 million; expenditures $188.5 million,
including capital expenditures of $94 million (1990 est.)
</p>
<list>
<l>Exports: $72 million (f.o.b., 1990 est.)</l>
<l> commodities: electricity, wood products, coffee, tin</l>
<l> partners: Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam, USSR, US, China</l>
<l>Imports: $238 million (c.i.f., 1990 est.)</l>
<l> commodities: food, fuel oil, consumer goods,
manufactures</l>
<l> partners: Thailand, USSR, Japan, France, Vietnam, China</l>
</list>
<p>External debt: $1.1 billion (1990 est.)
</p>
<p>Industrial production: growth rate 12% (1991 est.); accounts for
about 18% of GDP (1991 est.)
</p>
<p>Electricity: 226,000 kW capacity; 990 million kWh produced, 220 kWh
per capita (1992)
</p>
<p>Industries: tin and gypsum mining, timber, electric power,
agricultural processing, construction
</p>
<p>Agriculture: accounts for 60% of GDP and employs most of the work
force; subsistence farming predominates; normally self-sufficient in
nondrought years; principal crops - rice (80% of cultivated land),
sweet potatoes, vegetables, corn, coffee, sugarcane, cotton;
livestock - buffaloes, hogs, cattle, poultry
</p>
<p>Illicit drugs: illicit producer of cannabis, opium poppy for the
international drug trade, third-largest opium producer
</p>
<p>Economic aid: US commitments, including Ex-Im (FY70-79), $276
million; Western (non-US) countries, ODA and OOF bilateral
commitments (1970-89), $605 million; Communist countries (1970-89),
$995 million
</p>
<p>Currency: 1 new kip (NK)=100 at
</p>
<p>Exchange rates: new kips (NK) per US$1 - 710 (May 1992), 710
(December 1991), 700 (September 1990), 576 (1989), 385 (1988), 200
(1987)
</p>
<p>Fiscal year: 1 July-30 June
</p></body></article></text>