Aiding or abetting?

The GoL is engaged in a draconian effort to rid the country of all opium cultivation by the end of 2005, an initiative that has been encouraged and supported by inter- national agencies such as UNDCP/UNODC and the US government. [...] Internal Resettlement and International Aid Agencies in the Lao PDR Ian G. Baird and Bruce Shoemaker1 INTRODUCTION: INTERNAL This report provides a summary of some of the key RESETTLEMENT IN THE LAO PDR concepts and programs associated with internal resettle- ment in Laos, a review of the research on its impacts, A number of programs and policies currently in place and an overview of the approache [...] To support the GoL’s policy, the Tropical Forestry Action Plan was unveiled the following year by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and UNDP. [...] And at the 2004 NAFRI con- eradication was not a GoL priority, although there was a ference, senior officials at the Ministry of Agriculture willingness to institute development programs that would and Forestry stated that the GoL goal was to reduce shift- reduce the need for growing opium in upland communi- ing cultivation, not eliminate it, and that the term “eradi- ties. [...] There is a ten- 3. Security Concerns: Most of the internal resettlement dency to devalue or neglect important issues such as the associated with security issues took place during and availability of adequate land for farming and grazing live- shortly after the war, and during the turbulent years of stock as well as access to forestry and fishery resources, the late 1970s and early 1980s (Goudineau