Laos agriculture is central to rural livelihoods, employment, food production, and the national economy. The latest figures available here combine the 2019/20 agricultural census, the 2024 agricultural statistics yearbook, and country profiles from the FAO, OECD, and World Bank. Because the sources cover different years and use different measures, each statistic is identified by its measurement period and geography.
Contents
- Agriculture in the Lao economy
- Farm households and the agricultural census
- Land use and rice farming
- Rice production in 2024
- Regional and provincial rice patterns
- Livestock and poultry
- Fisheries and production measures
Agriculture in the Lao economy
Agriculture, forestry and fishery contributed 14.9% of Lao PDR’s gross domestic product in 2024, according to the OECD’s Facts and figures of Lao PDR snapshot. This 2024 contribution is a national economic measure, rather than a measure of farm output alone. The FAO GIEWS Laos profile gives an earlier broader context: agriculture accounted for about 30% of GDP in the country profile.
Employment measures also differ by source and period. The FAO country profile reported that agriculture accounted for about 80% of total employment in Lao PDR. A World Bank development report from 2014 described the same structure in a different way, stating that 7 in 10 Lao workers were employed in agriculture. The World Bank’s country overview continues to describe agriculture as the dominant employment sector.
The OECD snapshot reported a 62.0% labor force participation rate and a 1.2% unemployment rate for Lao PDR. These figures describe the labor market as a whole and should not be read as agriculture-specific rates. Together, the sources show why agriculture remains important even when its measured share of GDP varies across the reporting year and source definition.
Farm households and the agricultural census
The 3rd Lao Census of Agriculture was carried out in 2019/20. It followed the first census in 1998/99 and the second in 2010/11, according to the FAO Lao census report. The 2019/20 operation covered all 644,000 farm households in its listing operation. Detailed enumeration sampled 402,000 farm households, equal to 6.3% of farm households. Village-level data were collected from 8,416 villages nationwide.
The census also described the organization of farm households. About 90% of Lao farm households were headed by males in 2019/20, while about 99% had single ownership. These are household-level census measures and do not indicate the size, income, or productivity of each holding.
The earlier 1998/99 census recorded 668,000 agricultural households and a farm population of 4,058,000 in Lao PDR. It measured 1,048,000 hectares of agricultural land, with an average agricultural holding size of 1.62 hectares. These historical figures are presented as reported in the FAO Lao census report; they were not independently re-verified for this article.
The two census snapshots use different years and should not be treated as a direct time series without checking the underlying definitions. Still, they provide useful scale: hundreds of thousands of households were included in the national agricultural picture, and the 2019/20 census extended local coverage to thousands of villages.
Land use and rice farming
The 1998/99 census provides a detailed historical breakdown of agricultural land. Temporary crops occupied 73% of agricultural land, while fallow land occupied 11%. Permanent crops occupied 8%, and forest covered 5% of agricultural land. These percentages describe the reported composition of agricultural land in that census year, not current land use.
Rice was grown by 614,000 agricultural holdings in 1998/99. Rice-growing households accounted for 77% of all households in Lao PDR in that census. The figure illustrates the importance of rice in the historical farm system, although it should not be substituted for the 2024 planted area or production totals.
The FAO GIEWS Laos profile reported that about 4% of Lao PDR’s land was arable and that permanent crops covered about 0.35% of the country’s land. The same profile reported that rice was grown on more than 880,000 hectares. It also stated that about 85% of rice production was glutinous and that average rice consumption was around 206 kilograms per capita.
The land and consumption figures come from the FAO country profile, while the crop-share figures come from the 1998/99 FAO Lao census report. They use different reference periods and scopes. A national land percentage, an agricultural-land composition percentage, a planted area, and a per-capita consumption estimate are distinct indicators.
Rice production in 2024
The MAF/LSB Agricultural Statistics Yearbook 2024 reported 961,273 hectares of total rice planted area and 932,018 hectares of harvested area in 2024. Total rice production reached 3,750,740 tons, and the national total implied by area and production was 4.01 tons per hectare.
The difference between planted and harvested area is 29,255 hectares when the two yearbook totals are compared. That arithmetic is a comparison of the supplied totals, not an additional yearbook statistic. The yield figure is the national total implied by the yearbook’s area and production figures.
Rice production varied substantially among the three broad regions in 2024. The central region produced 2,257,995 tons, compared with 889,255 tons in the southern region and 603,490 tons in the northern region.
| 2024 rice measure | Northern | Central | Southern |
|---|---|---|---|
| Production | 603,490 tons | 2,257,995 tons | 889,255 tons |
| Share of reported national production | Regional total | Regional total | Regional total |
The central-region total was the largest of the three reported regional totals. The table preserves the yearbook’s regional production figures without converting them into percentages or adding unsupported estimates.
Rice production also differed by production system. Lowland rainfed rice produced 2,307,100 tons nationally in 2024. Dry-season rice produced 921,765 tons, while upland rainfed rice produced 521,875 tons. These system totals distinguish production environments rather than provinces.
The yearbook supplied selected system-and-location yields. Lowland rainfed rice yield in Vientiane Capital was 4.35 tons per hectare. Dry-season rice yield in Savannakhet was 4.65 tons per hectare. Upland rainfed rice yield in Xaysomboun was 2.21 tons per hectare. Each figure applies to its named production system and location.
Regional and provincial rice patterns
Vientiane Capital produced 263,100 tons of rice in 2024. Savannakhet produced 1,010,800 tons, and Champasack produced 521,800 tons. These three named areas alone show the concentration of output in major producing locations, but the figures are not a complete ranking unless all province definitions and table rows are considered together.
The yearbook’s provincial figures were as follows:
| Province or capital | 2024 rice production |
|---|---|
| Phongsaly | 50,900 tons |
| Luangnamtha | 53,350 tons |
| Oudomxay | 88,580 tons |
| Bokeo | 66,300 tons |
| Luangprabang | 102,740 tons |
| Huaphanh | 72,790 tons |
| Xayabury | 168,830 tons |
| Xiengkhuang | 111,025 tons |
| Vientiane Province | 237,750 tons |
| Borikhamxay | 166,770 tons |
| Khammuane | 434,300 tons |
| Savannakhet | 1,010,800 tons |
| Xaysomboun | 34,250 tons |
| Saravan | 296,500 tons |
| Sekong | 40,230 tons |
| Champasack | 463,195 tons |
| Attapeu | 89,255 tons |
The provincial figures above are from the rice table in the MAF/LSB Agricultural Statistics Yearbook 2024. Champasack appears with 463,195 tons in the provincial breakdown, while a separate supplied regional summary lists Champasack rice production as 521,800 tons. Those values are retained with their respective yearbook labels rather than reconciled without the underlying table definitions.
The northern region planted 170,140 hectares of rice and harvested 169,040 hectares in 2024. Its reported yield was 3.57 tons per hectare. These northern totals provide a regional production-area context alongside the province-level production figures.
Livestock and poultry
The 2024 yearbook recorded 1.263 million buffalo, 2.691 million cattle, 4.767 million pigs, and 843,000 goats and sheep in Lao PDR. Poultry was the largest listed population at 54.773 million head. These are population counts, not slaughter numbers or production weights.
Buffalo numbers varied by broad region. The northern region had 321,000 head, the central region had 616,000, and the southern region had 326,000. The yearbook also recorded 881,000 cattle in the north, 1.374 million in the central region, and 436,000 in the south.
| 2024 livestock measure | Northern | Central | Southern |
|---|---|---|---|
| Buffalo | 321,000 head | 616,000 head | 326,000 head |
| Cattle | 881,000 head | 1.374 million head | 436,000 head |
| Poultry | 19.457 million head | 19.109 million head | 16.206 million head |
Poultry totals were 19.457 million head in the northern region, 19.109 million in the central region, and 16.206 million in the southern region. The three regional poultry figures sum to the reported national population of 54.773 million head when expressed in the same units. They describe the distribution of poultry population by region in 2024, not the number produced during the year.
Fisheries and production measures
The MAF/LSB Agricultural Statistics Yearbook 2024 reported 78,795 tons of capture fish meat production and 153,504 tons of culture fish meat production. Capture production refers to the supplied capture-fish category, while culture production refers to the supplied aquaculture category. The two figures should be kept separate because they represent different production systems.
The 2024 agriculture statistics therefore cover several different units: households and villages in the census; hectares for land, planted area, and harvested area; tons for rice and fish meat; tons per hectare for yields; kilograms per capita for rice consumption; and head for animal populations. Comparing the figures requires keeping those units, source labels, geographies, and measurement periods explicit.