Meeting on the Improvement of the Business Licensing Procedures under the Prime Minister’s Order No.03/PM

Vientiane Capital, 29 March, 2022, the Department of Enterprise Registration and Management (DERM) of the Ministry of Industry and Commerce (MoIC) organized a half-day Licensing Reform Coordination Committee Meeting on the improvement of the business licensing procedures under the Prime Minister’s Order No.03/PM, dated 21 January 2020, at the MOIC Meeting Hall, with support from the Lao Competitiveness and Trade Project. The meeting was honorably chaired by Mr. Aphisid Sengsourivong, Director-General of the Department of Enterprise Registration and Management. The meeting was attended by more than 80 participants from all licensing authorities in hybrid format.

The objectives of the meeting are to discuss the current progress; to provide an update to the list of all business activities from all agencies that require operating licenses; to introduce to the committee the portal of Inventory of Business Licenses (IBL) in Lao PDR and receive inputs; to present the draft of the Decision on Database Management of IBL which will comprise of representatives of all licensing authorities; and to discuss the challenges and required action in the next steps.

In his opening speech, Mr. Aphisid stressed the important role of the reform committee in realizing the successful implementation of PM Order No.03 for improving business environment, which is also set out as key priority areas in the National Agenda. The chair also thanked all the line agencies who have provided the requested list of business activities under their respective responsibilities and urged the remaining ministries to submit their list as soon as possible. Thus far, DERM has collected over 400 activities from 10 ministries and organizations. Mr. Aphisid also added that the list of all business activities that need operating licenses will provide first-hand information to the private sector, in conjunction with the lists of concessional and controlled activities, and this will eliminate information barriers and create better business-enabling environment in Lao PDR.

During the meeting, the representatives of licensing authorities shared their challenges in the reform progress caused by the COVID-19 pandemic as well as the reshuffle of staff within their organizations- which cause the disruption of information flow.

The participants of the meeting then agreed that DERM follow up after today’s meeting in getting written inputs to the draft of Decision on Database Management of IBL, and update to the names of the new member of the committee. IBL is expected to be officially launched in the near future once all information is up to date.
Concluding the meeting, Mr. Aphisid reaffirmed that DERM will continue to work closely with licensing agencies on training of the licensing manual and risk-based approach to licensing, and to coordinate directly with each agency to identify reform priorities, clear work plan and required support.