Overview: Laos has had a Communist centrally planned economy with government ownership and control of major productive enterprises. Since 1986, however, the government has been decentralizing control and encouraging private enterprise. Laos is a landlocked country with a primitive infrastructure; 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.

National product: GDP - purchasing power equivalent - $4.1 billion (1993 est.)

National product real growth rate: 7% (1992 est.)

National product per capita: $900 (1993 est.)

Inflation rate (consumer prices): 9.8% (1992 est.)

Unemployment rate: 21% (1989 est.)

Budget:
revenues: $83 million
expenditures: $188.5 million, including capital expenditures of $94 million (1990 est.)

Exports: $133 million (f.o.b., 1992 est.)
commodities: electricity, wood products, coffee, tin
partners: Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam, FSU, US, China

Imports: $266 million (c.i.f., 1992 est.)
commodities: food, fuel oil, consumer goods, manufactures
partners: Thailand, FSU, Japan, France, Vietnam, China

External debt: $1.1 billion (1990 est.)

Industrial production: growth rate 12% (1991 est.); accounts for about 18% of GDP (1991 est.)

Electricity:
capacity: 226,000 kW
production: 990 million kWh
consumption per capita: 220 kWh (1992)

Industries: tin and gypsum mining, timber, electric power, agricultural processing, construction

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

Illicit drugs: illicit producer of cannabis, opium poppy for the international drug trade, third-largest opium producer (180 metric tons in 1993)

Economic aid:
recipient: 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

Currency: 1 new kip (NK) = 100 at
Exchange rates: new kips (NK) per US$1 - 720 (July 1993). 710 (May 1992), 710 (December 1991), 700 (September 1990), 576 (1989)

Fiscal year: 1 July - 30 June

NOTE: The information regarding Laos on this page is re-published from the 1995 World Fact Book of the United States Central Intelligence Agency. No claims are made regarding the accuracy of Laos Economy 1995 information contained here. All suggestions for corrections of any errors about Laos Economy 1995 should be addressed to the CIA.