Rubber is one of the hottest commodities in world markets. Many Asian
countries are the major rubber producers. Lao PDR is also influenced by
surrounding by important rubber producers and markets such as Thailand,
China, and Vietnam. While rubber cultivation is expanding rapidly in Lao PDR,
the Government and different international organisations, including
institutional arrangements, planning, policy, regulation and the information
that supports, are paying great attention and express their concerns on the
industry. Many issues related to rubber were raised and discussed within
related agencies. The Vientiane Smallholder Rubber Workshop in June 2006
and the NAFRI Rubber Stakeholders Meeting in December 2006 also had
highlighted many concerns about the economic, social and environmental
impacts of the rapidly expanding sector including the rapid, unplanned and
uncontrolled landscape change and lack of information, transparency, and
accountability in the rubber plantation.
The objectives of this research were to 1) explore the existing policy support
for farmers planting rubber, contract system between investor and producer,
credit support for farmers, facilitation in terms of permission for rubber
plantation and trade, different regulations including taxes and make a market
analysis, 2) make an analysis of the market options for farmers planting
rubber and examine factors having an impact on market efficiency and
analyze the market chain, 3) make a livelihood analysis, change of standard
of living, agricultural practices and relationship between farmers since the
inception of rubber planting, and 4) determine the regional aspects of rubber
plantation and option and finally come up with the policy briefs for suitable
land use, technical aspects, socio-economic and livelihood improvement.
The research methodology used was intergraded with different techniques
such as reviewing secondary information, conducting in-depth face-to-face
interviews by using both interview guidelines and structural interview question
with rubber farmers and other government stakeholders. After that the data
was analysed by using SPSS for Microsoft Windows to find out the statistics
such as frequencies, percentage, mean, maximum, and minimum.
The results were found that there are some existing supports to the farmers
planting rubber such as financial support from the Agricultural Promotion. The
government initiated some policies to eliminate slash and burn agriculture and
establish a permanent crop. The government also initiated the policy for
poverty eradication by the year 2020, which farmers have to increase their
income. Planting rubber trees is one of the promoted agricultural activities.