Establishing a monitoring system on investment in Laos's land

• Published in: Appropriate technology Vol. 37; no. 3; p. 16
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Burnham Research Information Ltd 01-09-2010
• Subjects: Developing countries; Foreign investment; Global positioning systems; GPS; Hydroelectric power; Land development; LDCs; Leasing; Natural resources; Plantations; Software; Laos
• ISSN: 0305-0920; 1751-6900

The Lao National Land Management Authority (NLMA) has the mandate to identify and define laws, policies and strategic plans for managing and administering land and natural resources in a sustainable way. Demand for land and natural resource use increased dramatically within the last two decades, especially local and external investors want to use large land areas for activities within agriculture, forestry industry, mining and tourism sector by leasing or conceding. Since investments in land have increased dramatically in the last years and no reliable and comprehensive data about such investments was available, mid 2008 NLMA requested GTZs support in collecting comprehensive data on all existing concession and lease projects. A team was trained in handling a Data Base System, GPS-equipment usage, mapping and creating spatial data sets. The initiative of NLMA supported by GTZ has brought for the first time a certain amount of transparency on investment projects.