Govt provides shifting farmers with permanent home
 
Vientiane Times, 22 March 2010
 
The government is preparing a 400-hectare site in Nongxan village,
Kasy district, Vientiane province, to permanently house farming
families who make their living from shifting cultivation.
 
The families will come from Vientiane and Huaphan provinces, along
with some Hmong families who recently returned to Laos after being
detained in Thailand.
 
Officials in charge of the resettlement are accelerating the building
of 120 houses, a primary school, meeting room and dispensary in the
village. They hope to accommodate the newcomers within the next week.
 
Deputy Director General (Deputy Army Chief) of the General Staff
Department, Ministry of National Defence, Brigadier General Bouasieng
Champaphanh, asked officials in charge to prepare a lucky draw for the
incoming families to select a house.
 
Brig Gen Bouasieng, his delegation and local media visited the village
on Thursday.
 
The deputy army chief instructed builders to finish some of the houses
and the gravity-fed water system within a week so that people can get
clean water as soon as they move in.
 
He asked officials to speed up work such as clearing some of the land
so the families could plant a crop of rice (khao hai), stressing the
need to prepare seeds for urgent distribution.
 
The villagers will farm the rice for two years while officials build
an irrigation system, after which the khao hai plantation will be
developed into rice fields.
 
The construction of a 13.5-km road to link the village with the
nearest township is also being accelerated.
 
Electricite du Laos has conducted a survey to connect the village to
the electricity grid, said district Governor Mr Bounsone Phetlavanh,
who accompanied the delegation.
 
Several families have already arrived in the village and are living in
temporary shelters while they wait for their houses to be finished.
 
The state-funded village will be set aside for multi-ethnic groups who
traditionally engage in shifting cultivation.
 
More families from the district as well as 54 families from Huaphan
province who engage in shifting cultivation will move to the village
later, Mr Bounsone said.
 
The resettlement of the families is in line with government policy to
move shifting farmers to permanent dwellings to make it easier for the
government to introduce development projects that help disadvantaged
people. Such projects are in the fields of education, healthcare, and
income generation.
 
T he government's attempts to end the longstanding, low income
practice of shifting cultivation will help prevent more forests being
felled.
 
The policy is aimed at raising people's incomes in pursuit of the
quest to raise everyone above the poverty line as set by the UN.
 
During the visit, Brig Gen Bouasieng presented food supplies to the
villagers.