but each year flood, pests, and localized drought cause
shortages in various parts of the country. For the foreseeable future
the economy will continue to depend on aid from the IMF and other
international sources; aid from the former USSR and Eastern Europe has
been cut sharply. As in many developing countries, deforestation and
soil erosion will hamper efforts to maintain the high rate of GDP
growth.

National product: GDP - purchasing power parity - $4 billion (1994
est.)

National product real growth rate: 8.4% (1994 est.)

National product per capita: $850 (1994 est.)

Inflation rate (consumer prices): 6.5% (1994 est.)

Unemployment rate: 21% (1992 est.)

Budget:
revenues: $NA
expenditures: $NA

Exports: $277 million (f.o.b., 1994 est.)
commodities: electricity, wood products, coffee, tin, garments
partners: Thailand 57%, Germany 10%, France 10%, Japan 5% (1991)

Imports: $528 million (c.i.f., 1994 est.)
commodities: food, fuel oil, consumer goods, manufactures
partners: Thailand 55%, Japan 16%, China 8%, Italy 4% (1991)

External debt: $NA

Industrial production: growth rate 7.5% (1992 est.); accounts for 18%
of GDP (1992 est.)

Electricity:
capacity: 260,000 kW
production: 870 million kWh
consumption per capita: 44 kWh (1993)

Industries: tin and gypsum mining, timber, electric power,
agricultural processing, construction

Agriculture: principal crops - rice (80% of cultivated land), sweet
potatoes, vegetables, corn, coffee, sugarcane, cotton; livestock -
buffaloes, hogs, cattle, poultry

Illicit drugs: illicit producer of cannabis, opium poppy for the
international drug trade, fourth largest opium producer (85 metric
tons in 1994); heroin producer; increasingly used as transshipment
point for heroin produced in Burma

Economic aid:
recipient: US commitments, including Ex-Im (FY70-79), $276 million;
Western (non-US) countries, ODA and OOF bilateral commitments
(1970-89), $605 million; Communist countries (1970-89), $995 million;
international assistance in loans and grant aid (1993/94) $217.7
million

Currency: 1 new kip (NK) = 100 at

Exchange rates: new kips (NK) per US$1 - 717 (1994 est.), 720 (July
1993). 710 (May 1992), 710 (December 1991), 700 (September 1990), 576
(1989)

Fiscal year: 1 October - 30 September

@Laos:Transportation

Railroads: 0 km

Highways:
total: 14,130 km
paved: 2,260 km
unpaved: 11,870 km (1992 e