Japan gives further boost to Lao business operators

A project to boost the capacity of business professionals and networking through the Laos-Japan Human Resource Development Institute (LJI) at the National University of Laos will continue to expand cooperation be-tween business operators as well as investment between Laos and Ja-pan.

Participants pose for a photo at the 3rd Joint Coordination Committee Meeting of a project for the capacity development of business profes-sionals.

The project will strengthen new entrepreneurs’ skill development, tech-nical cooperation, networking, cultural exchanges and relations between Laos and Japan. The 3rd Joint Coordination Committee Meeting of the project took place yesterday in Vientiane.
It was organised by the LJI and the National University of Laos (NUOL) in cooperation with the Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA) to evaluate the achievements and implementation of the project from September 2021-August 2022, and approve plans for the second phase of the project from 2022-2026.
The meeting was chaired by NUOL Vice President, Assoc. Prof. Phosy Thipdavanh, and the Chief Representative of the JICA Laos Office, Mr Toshio Nagase.
Over the past year, the coordination committee, and in particular the Laos-Japan Human Resource Development Institute, has further ex-panded cooperation around technical support and business operators, as well as new entrepreneurs and business networking expansion, and bolstered Laos-Japan relations through cultural exchanges.    
The committee has further improved human resource development in line with public needs, especially in relation to business development and new entrepreneurs through the LJI SUSU (Start-up and Scale-up) initiative.
This scheme has enabled business operators to improve goods pro-duced for export, especially to Japan, while start-up business operators were given assistance with technical and business operations.
The Laos-Japan Human Resource Development Institute also devel-oped a professional executive training curriculum and a Master’s in Business Administration (MBA) curriculum.
In terms of cultural exchange, the LJI created a Lao teaching curriculum for the Japanese and held technical and cultural exchange workshops with students from Japanese universities both online and off-line, sup-ported by JICA.
The Laos-Japan Human Resource Development Institute has expanded cooperation with regard to technical and information support for govern-ment organisations and relevant institutions in Laos and signed a Memo-randum of Understanding with international organisations to strengthen business development and information exchange.
In the second phase of the project, the LJI will further strengthen the ca-pacity of business professionals and networking and update the man-agement skills of professional executives under the Keiei-juku course.
Seminars on foreign networking, including for the LJI SUSU, will be ar-ranged to encourage business operators to develop products for the domestic market and export. The Laos-Japan Human Resource Development Institute will assist new entrepreneurs through consultation and knowledge exchange with teachers and experts from Laos and Japan in order to build their capaci-ty and improve their products so they can maintain quality and quantity in line with the expanding economy.   
The first phase of the project took place from September 2019-August 2022. The overall goal is to strengthen the economic relationship between Laos and Japan through human resource development for industry at the Laos-Japan Human Resource Development Institute.
It is envisaged that through the project, the Institute will become the cen-tre of human resource development for industry and business infor-mation and networking services.

By Times Reporters
(Latest Update July 28, 2022)