Reservations aired by neighbouring countries over the dam’s potential to harm fisheries and farming downstream have yet to receive attention.
Category: Laos
Lao Premier Announces New Power Rates Following Widespread Public Anger at Costs
Power prices have become a sensitive issue in Laos, where people were already poor before the COVID-19, while the country builds billion-dollar hydropower dams to export electricity.
Bidding for Fifth Thai-Lao Friendship Bridge project scheduled for July
The project, designed to link Thailand’s Bueng Kan province with Laos’ Bolikhamsai province across Mekong River, is estimated to cost US$40.88 million.
Lao Residents Chafe at Chinese-Language Signs at Construction Sites, SEZs
Lao residents are concerned with their powerful northern neighbor’s growing economic influence in the impoverished one-party communist state.
Laos sees more revenue from coffee
However, the number of coffee plantations has decreased by around five to 10 per cent in the first five months as growers shift to cassava for better incomes.
Vientiane residents to access sustainable waste management system
Vientiane will be recognised as a city where the informal waste pickers are integrated into the formal waste management system and benefit from social protection schemes.
Lao Villager Held in Detention Three Months After Land Protest in Vientiane
Rights groups say the illegal appropriations violate basic human rights and that such land grabs are a major cause of social tensions in Laos and in neighboring countries in Southeast Asia.
Laos Plans New Coal-Fired Power Plant in Sekong Province
Health experts say local communities near Laos’ first coal plant completed in 2015 are at risk of cancer, respiratory problems, and birth defects from pollution.
China’s BRI strategy and Laos
Consistent engagement with China could potentially allow Beijing to have an easy hold over them and become a tool to push through their own strategic interests.
Analysts: Rising Debt Burden Could Make Laos More Reliant on China
What China gets from the bilateral relationship ranges from Vientiane resisting joint ASEAN action in the South China Sea, to a pending rail line that will link China to Laos and, eventually, its neighbors.