Smallholder livestock owners in Laos traditionally keep cattle as a means of storing wealth, a source of income, for meat consumption, livelihoods, to provide draught power for transport, traditional culture, and provision of manure as fertilizer for cropping. Ruminant production in Laos is still dominated by small-scale or backyard producers using traditional techniques with mostly indigenous breeds usually kept under free range situations; ruminants graze on natural pastures, on the roadside, on fallow land, in paddy fields after the harvest, and in the forest, hence natural pastures represent the main source of ruminant feed in Laos. FAOSTAT [3] reported the total arable land of Laos is about 1.52 million ha and permanent meadows and pastures approximately 0.67 million ha in 2014. Moreover, the quality and quantity of the natural forages found in Laos depend on the plant species and season [4,5]. There is a general decline in crude protein content in most common forage crops from the rainy season to the dry season. Although the rainy season produces high quantity and quality forage, feed resources are inadequate because ruminants are not allowed to venture onto the wetlands or the rice paddy fields during the rainy season. As rice growing occupies an important proportion of arable land in Laos, farmers tend to restrict the number of cattle they raise to avoid excessive damage to rice paddy fields for which the owner is held responsible. This controls ruminant nutrition to feed accessible on the roadside, levy banks and other non-cultivated areas.

Currently, livestock is one of the fastest growing agricultural subsectors in Laos. It was reported that cattle herd sizes have grown by an average 5 percent per year, from 1.52 million in FY2010–2011 to 1.81 million in FY2014–2015 [1], with this growth is motivated by rapidly increasing requirements for livestock products by 3.5 to 4.0 percent annually, leading to expanded livestock production in Laos [6]. This demand is being driven by increased incomes and urbanization. Laos had around 1.15 million of cattle in 2000 with an annual growth rate of 2.16% in the period 2000 through 2014 [3]. In 2016, the Laos cattle population was about 1.88 million head, with smallholder farmers having approximately 98% of cattle in Laos. This is despite efforts by the Laos government to develop commercial-scale farms, of which there was 170 commercial cattle farms in 2016. About 56 percent of the cattle in Laos are in the Central region, 26 percent in the Northern region, and 17 percent in the Southern region (Table 1) [6].

FAOSTAT [3] reported that during 2013, pork consumption was estimated at 9.31 kg/capita, followed by bovine meat at 7.29 kg/capita and poultry meat 4.21 kg/capita. The resultant trends in meat consumption in Laos is shown in Figure 1. Laos domestic beef consumption has increased greatly since 1988 although the average price of buffalo and bovine meat have increased more than double from 4.09 US$ per kilogram in 2009 to 8.05 US$ per kilogram in 2016 [7–11] (Table 2) with a gross national income per capita of $ 2,150 in 2016 [12]. Per capita beef consumption rose from 6.12 kg/yr in 2000 to 7.29 kg/yr in 2013. Compared with other regional countries, meat consumption per capita in Laos was higher than in Thailand (2.56 kg/yr) and on par with that of Vietnam [3]. The growth in cattle production is mainly to meet increasing domestic demand. Recently, there has been a trend towards higher quality food and food diversity, mainly because of the growing economy and the open market systems. Although, beef consumption in Laos is almost 100% of the total meat production of the country, high quality beef needs to be imported for restaurants and supermarkets in Vientiane, the Laos capital.

The Laos government’s objective is to improve beef pro duction by increasing the live weight of the Lao-native cattle and by introducing exotic breeds. Recently, Wagyu cattle farming in Laos has been established with the aim of providing high quality meat. Whilst the supply of bovine meat can fulfill domestic needs, the country relies on imports to provide breeding animals to household producers. In addition, export of livestock products from Laos is very limited and the export value of meat is low (Table 3) and has fluctuated over the years [6].

Ruminant production in Laos is still dominated by small-scale or backyard producers. Growth performance of ruminants is principally limited by natural forage quantity and quality in Laos because the ruminant grazed freely on roadsides, grassland, and the paddy field after harvesting during the day and return home later in the day to the nearby villages. Our preliminary work on the quality and chemical composition of natural pasture in Laos (Table 4) has demonstrated that most local grass species have low nutritive value, resulting in low voluntary feed intake and nutrient digestibility. High quality forage plantations have been encouraged to manage feed shortages and deliver a resource for fattening of ruminants before sale to increase their value. Several species of grass, including Napier grass (Pennisetum purpureum), Ruzi grass (Brachiaria ruziziensis), Mulato grass (Brachiaria sp.), Guinea grass (Panicum sp.), Signal grass (Brachiaria decumbens), Atratum grass (Paspalum atratum), and other high quality grasses have been imported into Laos to complement existing natural feeds. Moreover, farmers in Laos have been trained in silage production using high quality grasses but silage has not yet been implemented in many farms. Usually, farmers offer rice straw as the main roughage source to their animals. Therefore, large numbers of ruminants suffer from serious feed shortages both in quality and quantity.