Nagnoby Bank is considering lending about 15 billion kip to a local businessman to establish a cassava processing plant in Borikhan district, Borikhamxay province. The plant would cut and dry cassava before distributing it to local and international suppliers. Currently most of the cassava farmers in the district supply raw cassava to the Lao Indochina Group (LIG), which produces powder for export mainly to China. The proposed plant would provide a ready market for local cassava farmers into the future. The bank has provided loans of more than 600 billion kip to promote local production, including three cassava processing plants in Vientiane provinces and a fruit juice processing plant in Luang Prabang province. The cassava processing plant in Vientiane province began production last year and has capacity to produce about 200 tonnes of cassava powder per day. It primarily exports to Vietnam.
