Government urges journalists to inspect development projects

Government urges journalists to inspect development projects

(KPL) The government is welcoming Lao journalists to scrutinize its development projects and report their observations in the media at a time when the financial tsunami is having an adverse effect on them and this was said by the government secretariat chief, Cheuang Sombounkhan.
The global financial crisis had so adversely affected the development plans of the Lao government that it is calling on all the business units in the country to join the government to brainstorm to solve this problem.
Lao economists suspected that it is the global financial crisis that caused foreign funds to decrease the money allocated to development projects in Laos, causing development projects to advance at a snail pace and accelerating unemployment.
Many development projects that were funded by the government and by foreign funds had some of their funds misappropriated and the Lao journalists could carry out investigative reporting on them so that such actions would ultimately act as a kind of stimulus for development.
Amid the global financial crisis, the Lao government promised that it would make efforts to solve many problems such as the slump in the price of maize, decrease in the production of garments, fewer tourist arrivals to the country and lower production of furniture.
He said that the government is considering the availability of low interest loans by all the banks for business units to enable them to continue to fund their businesses during this financial crisis and also to cancel some taxes.
The press conference was held in the Prime Minister’s Office on Friday and it was specially meant for the members of the Lao press fraternity.