Lao People's Democratic Republic

<p>As part of its &ldquo;Support of Regional Economic Cooperation in Asia&rdquo; (SRECA) Project, GIZ requested the assistance of ITC to set up several SME Trade Academy online courses on trade integration topics and make them available in the four focus countries in their respective national languages. This is taking place in the context of efforts by SCRECA partners to provide online capacity building solutions following the COVID-19 outbreak.</p>

<p><span style="color: rgb(97, 189, 109);">New text:&nbsp;</span></p><p><span style="color: rgb(97, 189, 109);">The ITC T4SD Hubs act as a <strong>one-stop shop offering integrated sustainability solutions supporting SMEs to transition to a green economy</strong>. The T4SD Hubs are a 5 year project implemented in 7 countries/regions: the Caribbean, Ghana, Kenya, Laos, Nepal, Peru and Viet Nam.&nbsp;</span></p><p><span style="color: rgb(97, 189, 109);">The offering of the T4SD Hubs is structured around 5 thematic areas under which awareness raising workshops, e-learnings and customized coaching programmes are offered to <strong>build the business case for implementing sustainable business practices:&nbsp;</strong></span></p><p><span style="color: rgb(97, 189, 109);">These thematic areas include:</span></p><ul><li><span style="color: rgb(97, 189, 109);">Compliance with Voluntary Sustainability Standards&nbsp;</span></li><li><span style="color: rgb(97, 189, 109);">Resource efficiency and circular production&nbsp;</span></li><li><span style="color: rgb(97, 189, 109);">Climate resilience&nbsp;</span></li><li><span style="color: rgb(97, 189, 109);">Positioning sustainable products in the international market&nbsp;</span></li><li><span style="color: rgb(97, 189, 109);">Access to green finance&nbsp;</span></li></ul><p><span style="color: rgb(97, 189, 109);">Besides the piloting of the service offering to built the necessary technical capacity, the T4SD Hub team supports the T4SD Hub hosts in building the needed management capacity and structures to roll out the service offering.</span></p><p><br></p><p>Old text:&nbsp;</p><p align="JUSTIFY" dir="LTR"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">The ITC T4SD Hubs provides full support to SMEs in the implementation of green business practices. T4SD leverages its international networks to support SMEs in building green business strategies to access green finance and international markets for sustainable products, thus maximizing the T4SD programme&rsquo;s impact on the ground.</span></p><p align="JUSTIFY" dir="LTR"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">T4SD establishes six T4SD Hubs in Ghana, Kenya, Laos, Nepal, Peru and Vietnam until 2022.</span></p><p align="JUSTIFY" dir="LTR"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">The T4SD Hubs consolidate T4SD&rsquo;s tools and services by acting as a <strong>one-stop shop offering integrated sustainability solutions for SMEs</strong>. The Hubs are replicable and scalable in size and implement key recommendations and findings of the 2017 OED evaluation of the T4SD Programme.&nbsp;</span></p>

<p>The action, funded by the EU, aims at providing support to the target countries in ASEAN (Lao PDR and Vietnam), in the area of plant health, and pesticides use and control of the F&amp;V as well as on other plant products supply chains.</p><p>The overall objective is <strong>to improve food safety through better governance</strong>. The specific objective is <strong>to strengthen regulatory framework for control of plant health and pesticides in the fruits and vegetable sector and other plant products</strong> through the application of norms and standards and improve market access.</p><p>The expected results are:</p><p>- Improved awareness and knowledge of private sector and authorities on plant health and pesticides issues in fruits, vegetables and other plant products.</p><p>- Improved performance of the regulatory and control institutions and improved capacity of the fruits, vegetables and other plant product supply chain actors to comply with plant health and pesticides control&nbsp;</p><p>- Strengthened market access opportunities and facilitated business linkages of fruits, vegetables and other plant products actors from target countries to EU and regional markets.</p>

<p>The <strong>ARISE Plus Laos&nbsp;</strong>programme is a four-year programme that contributes to the integration of the Lao economy into global production chains through targeted support to both the public and private sectors, with a focus on smallholders and SMEs. It will concern specifically targeted sectors (e.g. wood processing and agro-based products).</p>