Present by F4 group by Mr. Khao, Mr. Sak, Mr. Phom, Mr. Oaun (Bounkane)

Target Cluster: Small- space furniture Cluster in Vientiane

Location  Vientiane  Vientiane is the capital of Lao PDR, which located in central of Laos  an essential economic zone central of education(many colleges, school, NUOL)  more modern city than other, have many hotels, apartments (small room)…  there are a lot of SMEs who do furniture business  good infrastructure  transportation and logistic

Description of Potential Members  Small Space Furniture was located in Chanthabouly District, which has more than 300 wood processing factories and furniture companies which employs about 5000 workforce.  Around the city there are transportation and logistic companies, textile factories; school and, Faculty of Forestry(National University of Laos) also were placed here which educate a lot of furniture workers

Client Products and Services  Small space furniture  Flooring  Household items  joinery products  Design  Repair and maintenance service  Etc…….

The Cluster Diagram

The Cluster Diagram (Cont’) Products / ServiceAreas Allocated / sq.m 1.Training centre Logistics and transportation 3. Quality Control Common website 5. Showroom, joining exhibition2, Warehouse5, Conference room 8. Maintenance service and repair 9. Healthcare service 10. Design Centre 11. Sport center2, Canteen Parking space Crane and forklift 15. Fire station 16. Social Affairs 17. Security system 18. Log pound5, Shuttle bus 20. SMEs (100 X 1,000 m 2 )100,000 TOTAL :111,650 m 2 Products and Service of the SME cluster “ Small furniture space”

Previous Cluster or EC Initiatives  Laos don’t have cluster yet

The Diagnostiques Survey  Have many small size wood processing factories run by households  Mostly they make the same furniture with different quality  Low price (small value add)  Limited skill, low technology, learn by themselves  New Hotels, Restaurants, office…  increase SSF’s demand   NEED to create CLUSTER

Potential stakeholders  SMEPDO  TPPD( Department of Trade Promotion and Product Development)  LNCCI  National University of Laos, Faculty of Forestry  Lao Wood Industry Association and Lao Furniture Association  GIZ (representative from wood value chain)  TFT/WWF Lao Forest and Trade Platform  3 SMEs (largest employment)

Cluster design  Who will be in the Cluster - SME who have an experience at least 5 years - Employ at least 10 workers -

Cluster design (cont’)  Incentives - Organizing a study and business tour in neighboring country(Thailand, Vietnam) - Promoting clusters - Tax incentive - Marketing and Promotion (Better trading environment) - Business matching - Grace period for land (10 years)/ basic infrastructure - Soft loan - Technology transfer

Cluster design (cont’)  Technical Assistance Needed - Training center - Design school - Faculty of Forestry (NOUL)  Financial Assistance Needed - SME fund - Lao Development Bank (SME bank)

Cluster design (cont’)  Proposed interventions and Potential Sponsors - JICA - TDF - GIZ - WWF

Conclusions and Recommendations  Conclusion - As mention above: now market need a lot of SSF - cluster has enough advantages to be able to remain competitive. Now we are ready to produce SSF  Recommendation - Government should provide: tax credits, innovative financing for furnishings manufacturers, investments in furniture research and development and job training to enhance the skills of legacy manufacturing workers - government could provide grants for researching innovation in furniture manufacturing.