2020 Volume 2020 Issue 130 Pages 14-24
Farmers in northern area of Laos are extremely poor. In order to reduce their poverty, they are also involved in other side-businesses such as rice liquor brewing aside of growing high value crops. Brewing of rice liquor hasn’t been of much emphasis on introduction of improved technology and capital input. Author implemented an in-depth interview with 10 farmers on the brewing process and characteristics of rice liquor and challenges faced. As the result from this investigation, it was identified that there would be two types in farmer brewing the rice liquor. One is farmer brewing in accordance with traditional method, using a material such as rice and aspergillus oryzae grown by himself. And another one is farmer putting his emphasis on brewing with lower cost, using purchased local broken rice and imported aspergillus oryzae. The important challenges on brewing the rice liquor are unhygienic brewing place, technological problems in each stage of brewing and lower selling price at the market.
