1

Revisiting the Determinants of Primary School
Enrolment in Lao PDR＊

Phanhpakit ONPHANHDALA
1. Introduction

Most less developed countries have devoted substantial proportions of theirresources to the expansion of education, especially for the primary level（UNESCO,
2007）. Education is universally recognized as to be associated not only with large
economic returns but also with many social returns including lower fertility and infantmortality, better child health and education, and reductions in gender and ethnic
inequality（Pschalopoulos and Patrinos, 2004; Strauss and Thomas, 1995）. It is argued
that in an early stage of a country s economic and educational development, school
access is likely to depend more heavily on those factors that encourage initial（timely）
attendance and retention. At later stages of educational development, when mostchildren completed basic schoolings, factors enhancing school quality becomes central
elements of development plan（Lloyd et al. 2000）.
In the case of Lao PDR1 where primary school enrolment is not yet universal, forpolicy implications in the educational sector to be more effective in terms of both
efficiency and equity, it is necessary to have a solid understanding of the process bywhich some children are sent to school and others are not. This paper attempts tounderstand the current patterns and trends in basic education in rural Lao PDR, andexamines the socioeconomic factors which influence the school access, from a regional
difference perspective.
To date, empirical studies that try to explain access to education among different
groups in Lao PDR are still very limited. A past study done by King and van de Walle（2007）examine school enrolment from a poverty perspective. They explore thedifferences in school enrolment for children aged 6 to 16 by urban/rural, boy/girl and

Lao-Tai-Kadai and other. In this paper, we further analyze the determinants of school＊Assistant Professor, Graduate School of International Cooperation Studies, Kobe University.

Journal of International Cooperation Studies, Vol.18, No.1（2010.6）

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enrolment differences among children standard aged 6 to 10 in rural areas by using
the same source, the so-called LECS 3, with the different approaches. We reconsider
the subdivision of ethnic affiliation2 and newly add parental educational levels andoccupations in the analysis. The newly proposed division of
group

and

low enrolment rate grouphigh enrolment rate

shows a number of differences indetermining access to schools .
3

The paper begins with an overview of trends in educational achievements in
Section 2, focusing on three major issues of education progress over time, current
enrolment and supply factor across region, gender and ethnic affiliation. Section 3
briefly presents the literature review and the empirical models, and outlines the data
description for the analysis. Section 4 tries to explain the determinants of school
enrolment by running multivariate regressions of the probability of school attendance
against individual, household, school and village-level characteristics. Section 5 offerssome concluding remarks.

2. Building an Education Future
2.1. Education Progress
Overall, education is among the better performing sectors in Lao PDR over the
past few decades. The most priority of policy interventions for education sector isequitable access . Net enrolment rate in primary schools rose from 58% in 1991 to
89% in 2008 upon the education reforms since the early 1990s, driven strongly byincreased female enrolment. The large improvement was achieved by

Lao

and

Tai-Kadai . In recent years, the gender inequality in urban areas was disappeared. In
opposite, there are still signs of divergence among gender and different ethnic groups
in rural areas. The progress is somehow slowing down during the past few years dueto the insufficient supply against a rapid growth of school age population. At these
rates the MDG targets look beyond reach. The overview of current patterns andtrends in education is well-profiled in King and van de Walle（2007）, MOE（2005, 2008）
and World Bank（2008）4.
Before 1989, Lao PDR had only a few private schools operating withoutauthorization. The government decided to encourage the creation and expansion ofprivate schools in order to take some of the pressure off the public sector in 1990

Revisiting the Determinants of Primary School Enrolment in Lao PDR

3（ADB, 1999）. The share of private schools in pre-primary level has increased steadily
from 12% in 1993 to 26% in 2005. In recent years, private higher education has
developed dramatically and occupies 31% of the total enrolment in 2005. On the other
hand, it is of particular concern that contributions from private schools in the primaryand secondary levels are only 2% of the total enrolment in both levels（ADB, 1999;
UNESCO, 2007）.
To date, the public spending on education in Lao PDR as a share of GDP and ashare of total government spending are still low by international and regional
standards5. Public expenditure on education in Lao PDR collapsed with the Asianfinancial crisis in 1997/98. By 2005, the levels have nearly recovered to that that of1995, both in relation to 2.3% of GDP and as 11.7% of total public spending. This
recovery relates largely to inputs from international development partners and does
not imply any improvement in the share of domestic funding or in the ratio ofrecurrent to investment budget. Educational spending per student is also extremely
low. Although primary schooling takes up the largest proportion of spending, this
proportion has been gradually declining since 1994/95, while the budget spent on
upper secondary and higher education has been increasing. This trend benefits thenon-poor（who are more likely to attend tertiary education）and stands in contrast to
the declared policy focus on achieving universal primary education（World Bank,
2007）.

2.2. Current Enrolment
The main reason why a child in school age had never been to school is surveyed
in LECS 3（NSC, 2004）. This paper finds that overall, the lack of educational resource
supplies（school is too far and no teacher supplies）is one of the biggest constraints,
especially in low enrolment provinces. Although small ratio of villages is without aprimary school, the shortage is that less than half of them offer the full five grades
program. The parental preferences in schooling measured byinterest

too youngandnorecorded at 50% and 25%, respectively. One-half of parents that answered

too youngare children who have aged eight or more. Moreover, the reasonnointerest is likely to reflect the internalization of some other potential reasons. On theother hand, it is surprisingly that had to work and too expensive added up only

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at 4%. Since private schools are very rare, the proportion of tuition fees in publicschools is less than 5% of total school cost.
The cost of uniforms occupied one-half of total school cost that households spent inrural areas. The cost of Textbooks and other education materials ranked at 23%,
which is the second highest item. Most of students walk to school and come backhome for lunch that resulted in a low share of food and transportation cost. However,the characteristics of farmer households in Lao PDR remain predominantly subsistent,labor intensive, and short of irrigated land and productive assets. Although rice is themain product of agricultural outputs, only one-third of its production is for market.
The expenditures on education that household spent for a child is a heavy burden,
when we compare to a low level of per capita income of rural farmers. Therefore,
policy makers should be directed at increasing the enrolment rates of children byfinding ways to relax the monetary constraint faced by farmers.

Enrolment by Different Groups
Based on the LECS 3 data, the paper finds that the net enrolment rates forchildren in the official primary school group（aged 6 to 10）was on average at 72% in
2002/03, of which the rates were roughly 89% vs. 68% in urban and rural areas,
respectively. Thus, average masks enormous variance among urban/rural andprovince. Except for few major cities of Luangprabang, Xayabury and Champasack,children in the Central are more likely to be in school than those in the North andSouth. For an example, net enrolment rates in five out of seven provinces in the North
do not reach 60%（see Figure 1）.
First ignoring the regional gap in Figure 2, the difference in net enrolment rate
between boy and girl（71% vs. 66%）is much smaller than the difference between Laoand ethnics（83% vs. 59%）. When regional aspect is considered, the gaps are clearlychanged between high group and low group. As shown in Figure 3, the gender gap
only exists in low group, of which the enrolment rates for boy and girl are 84% vs. 82%
and 62% vs. 54% in high group and low group, respectively. On the other hand, theethno-linguistic affiliation gap exists in both groups. The enrolment rates for Lao andethnics are 89% vs. 77% − a 12 percentage point difference in high group and 76% vs.
51% − a 25 percentage point difference in low group. It is worth noting that these

Revisiting the Determinants of Primary School Enrolment in Lao PDR

5numbers mask further disparities among ethnicity subgroups. Enrolment rates for the
Tibeto-Burman family are considerably lower than for others. Obviously, in the case of
Lao PDR, these imply that we must pay more attention on ethnic affiliation thangender issue, especially for children who live in low enrolment rate group.

Age at Entry
Similarly, based on the LECS 3 survey, the paper finds that many children enter
to the primary cycle later than the official entry age of six years old. It is only by age
nine or ten to achieve the maximum enrolment rate at the primary level. Again, it
shows that children − ethnics and in low group, enter school late than children − Laoand in high group, do so. There is a little difference between boy and girl, however.
Striking differences by groups and shocking numbers are the very low enrolmentof children age 6 and 7. Overall, only four out of ten children aged 6 in rural areas
attended school（71% for high group vs. 27% for low group）. With respect to genderissue, girls aged 6 both in high group and low group are even more likely to entry
school than boys（60% vs. 56% in high group and 28% vs. 26% in low group）. In termsof ethnic affiliation, Lao children aged 6 in both groups significantly entry school timely
than ethnic children（68% vs. 49% and 40% vs. 22% for high and low group,
respectively）. The higher the age, the smaller the gaps among different groups. With
respect to gender issue, girls aged 10 both in high group and low group are, bycontrast, less likely to enroll in school than boys（95% vs. 97% in high group and 72%
vs. 82% in low group）. In terms of ethnic affiliation, Lao children aged 10 in bothgroups are significantly enrolled in school timely than ethnic children（98% vs. 94%
and 92% vs. 70% for high and low group, respectively）. According to King and van deWalle（2007）, the average age at which children start school has declined remarkably
over time. In 2002/03, nearly 80% of children aged 10 entered school by age 8 ascompared with just slightly more than 20% for those aged 18. Similarly, the analysis
indicates a clear reduction for all groups even over a short space of time.

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100.0

Enrolment Rate（％）

80.0

60.0

40.0

20.0

u
pe

ck

ta
At

ng

sa

pa

ha

m

ne

ko

va

Se

Sa

ra

t

un
bo

he
ak

nn

ys

C

va

Xa

Sa

om

y

ne
ua

xa

m

m
ha

am

rik

Kh

.

ne

C

tia

Vi

en
Bo

ne

hu

en

en
Xi

Vi

gk

ya

tia

bu

an

g

ry

h

H

Xa

ua

ph

an

ng

o

Lu

an

gp

ra

ba

y

ke

om

O

ud

Bo

a
th

al
gs

am
gn

on

an
Lu

Ph

xa

y

0.0

Figure 1: Net Enrolment Rate by Province

Enrolment Rate（％）

100
80
60
40
20
0
All

Boy

Girl

Lao

Ethnics

Figure 2: Net Enrolment Rate by Gender and Ethnic Groups
100
Enrolment Rate（％）

Enrolment Rate（％）

100
80
60
40
20

80
60
40
20

0

0
All

Boy

Girl

Lao

Ethnics

All

Boy

Girl

Lao

Ethnics

Figure 3: Net Enrolment Rate by High Group （left side）and Low Group （right side)
Source: Author s calculation based on LECS 3, 2002/03

Revisiting the Determinants of Primary School Enrolment in Lao PDR

7

2.3 School Supply
An important determinant of whether a student goes to school is the availabilityof schools within a reasonable distance from the household. Besides, other supply
factors are also viewed to influence that decision such as the pupil-teacher ratio,
teachers

educational attainment and work experience, the availability of textbooks,

lunch program, and the physical condition of school buildings（Hanushek, 1995）. In
this subsection, we simply describe the level of school inputs, since Lao PDR does not
yet have in place a national assessment system of quality education such as student
performance, quality of teachers work and other learning indicators.
Nationally, about 80% of the populations of Lao PDR live in a village with a
primary school in 2002/03. Less than half of them could offer full five grades of the
primary cycle. This varies largely across region and province（NSC, 2004）. Children
who live in a village without a complete primary school have to continue to further
grade of the study in a near village with a complete primary school faraway.
Moreover, 10 provinces out of 18 provinces do not have private schools at all. 51 out of
76 private schools（or 67%）are concentrated in Vientiane capital（MOE, 2003）.
Regarding to the infrastructure characteristics of the primary schools between
urban and rural areas, the difference is much smaller with respect to classrooms withblackboards, functioning roofs and library, much greater with respect to availability ofelectricity, student toilet and rooms for teachers including the principal（King and vande Walle, 2007）. Another issue is the severe undersupply of teachers in rural areas.
This deployment issue is partly a result of a quota system that requires newly trainedteachers to return to their home district, thus restricting mobility and the capacity ofthe school system to balance teacher supply（ADB, 2000）. In many cases, non-official
teachers who have completed a teacher training course are employed by the villagers.
They receive only benefits from local community based income in cash and others inkind such as rice.
On average, the pupil-teacher ratio for primary schools nationally is around 30 andthe difference among groups is not large. Lao children are taught predominantly by

Lao teachers, while a much smaller proportion of children are taught by local teachers,
especially in remote areas. These are because local teachers are more likely to stay on
and know the local language and customs. The typical primary（official）teacher has

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13 years of teaching experience with a lower secondary certification plus formal
teacher training（8+3 years）. Although primary teachers earn only $39 per monthincluding various supplements, absenteeism is not a problem in Lao PDR（World
Bank, 2008）.

3. Literature Review on School Attendance and Data
Based on household survey data from developing countries, an enormous numberof studies showed that family background or socioeconomic status, measured byparental education, household resources and resources in the community, is an
important determinant of children s education. Children schooling outcomes may
measure by current school enrollment or years of schooling attainment. Examples ofthese studies include Rosenzweig and Wolpin（1982）for India, Behrman and Wolfe（1984）for Nicaragua, Birdsall（1985）for Brazil, Hossain（1989）for Bangladesh,
Singh（1992）for Brazil, Deolalikar（1993）for Indonesia, Glewwe and Jacoby（1994）
for Ghana, Singh and Santiago（1997）for Mexico, Sawada and Lokshin（2001）forPakistan, and Handa et al.（2004）for Mozambique.
The estimations of the determinants of children s welfare are guided by thefamiliar New Households Economics model of household decision-making as pioneered
work by works of Gary S. Becker, and the extensions to the model well-described by
Strauss and Thomas（1995）. What deters school enrolment differences amongchildren? Many past studies have found that the characteristics of children − age andgender; household-level variables − e.g. family income and size, age composition ofhousehold members, ethnic affiliation, and parental schooling and work specific; villagelevel variables such as urban/rural residence by province; and school-level variables −e.g. distance to school, teachers

characteristics and building facilities. In general,family background effects tend to dominate the school effects（Glewwe, 2002）.
There is abundant evidence that examined school enrolment choice in developing
countries, and the empirical model in this study is basically followed to the past
researches which mentioned above.
The primary school enrolment choice（probability to attend school）model is
specified respectively as following:

Revisiting the Determinants of Primary School Enrolment in Lao PDR

9ENi＝α0＋α1Schjk＋α2HRi＋βiCi＋γXi＋ui
Dependent variable: EN=1 if child ever enrolled school and 0 otherwise.
Exogenous household variables: Sch=educational levels of parents; HR=household
resources: namely per capita consumption, family size, family structure and ethnic
minorities; C=child characteristics: namely gender and child age; X=village
characteristics: school availability and regional dummy variables, and u=a residual
error. The estimation Methods for the equation is Probit Model（binary choices）,
which will be transformed to marginal effects. Huber-White consistent standard errors
and covariance is applied to correct for heteroskedasticity.
This study employs an unusually rich set of nationally household survey data, theso-called Lao Expenditure and Consumption Survey 3 in 2002/03（LECS 3）. It is thefirst household survey that provides detailed information on the educational sector.
Totally, 5,042 rural children aged 6 to 10 from the whole country are used for the
analysis and half of them are girls. 68% of children have attended school and the rests
have never been to school.
The samples are also classified into two categories of high enrolment rate groupand low enrolment rate group in Table 1. With respect to household characteristics,
the family size and age composition of household members are generally the sameamong groups. Over one-half of family members are young children. As expected,
family income level measured by per capita consumption is larger for high group thanfor low group. While most families in low group are ethnic minorities, one-half offamilies in high group are Lao. We have to drop Tibeto-Burman subgroup from theanalysis in the case of high group due to insufficient sample.
Given the overall low level of human capital in Lao PDR, the average parental
educational attainments of children in high group are much better than those in low
group. The higher level of educational attainment, the larger gaps between two
groups. For examples, children having uneducated mother are 37% and 53% for highgroup and low group, respectively. The number of children having mother with lower
secondary or higher in high group is double of those in low group.

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Table 1: Descriptive Statistics - Child aged 6 to 10 in Rural Lao PDR
Means of Variables
Enrolment Rate（%）
Child Gender（Boy =1, Girl = 0）
Household Characteristics
Income（per capita consumption, Kip）
Family Size（persons）
Share of Children aged 0 to 5（%）
Share of Children aged 6 to 14（%）
Share of Adults age 15 and up（%）
Lao（%）
Tai-Kadai（%）
Mon-Khmer（%）
Tibeto-Burman（%）
Hmong-Mien（%）
Father Characteristics
Schooling（years）
No Education（%）
Some Primary（%）
Completed Primary（%）
Lower Secondary or Higher（%）
Non-Farm（%）
Mother Characteristics
Schooling（years）
No Education（%）
Some Primary（%）
Completed Primary（%）
Lower Secondary or Higher（%）
Non-Farm（%）
School in Village
Complete Primary（%）
Some Primary（%）
No School（%）
Observations

All
68.35
50.93

High Group
82.86
51.05

Low Group
57.99
50.85

804,753
7.33
14.93
38.15
46.96
38.62
15.39
29.69
6.03
10.27

926,070
7.10
14.42
38.99
46.63
51.05
13.48
21.71
0.14
13.62

718,157
7.50
15.30
37.55
47.19
29.74
16.75
35.38
10.23
7.89

4.23
23.09
28.66
30.38
17.87
19.77

4.96
17.81
23.76
34.52
23.90
22.90

3.72
26.85
32.16
27.43
13.56
17.54

2.43
46.21
26.95
20.69
6.15
18.56

2.96
37.38
28.57
25.33
8.71
21.95

2.06
52.52
25.80
17.37
4.32
16.15

38.69
46.59
14.72
5,042

43.19
43.76
13.05
2,100

35.49
48.61
15.91
2,942

Note: High Enrolment Rate Group includes Luangprabang in North, six provinces in Center except for
Savannakhet, and Champasack in South. Low Enrolment Rate Group is the remainder.

4. Estimation Results
4.1. Full Sample Results
The estimates of the models for the total sample of children aged 6 to 10 confirm
the age progression in enrolment in all categories as shown in Table 2. Enrolment
rates peak at age 10, which are much later than the official starting age of six. Thereis no sign of the difference in delayed enrolment rate between boy and girl, but a large
difference across Lao and other ethnic subgroups. These results are consistent withKing and van de Walle（2007）.We confirm that girls are less likely to be enrolled thanboys but with a relatively small percentage point by 5%（as compared to 9% of theprevious study）, and that this disparity only exists among ethnic subgroups. In other
word, there is no gender disadvantage across Lao group. This new finding comes out

Revisiting the Determinants of Primary School Enrolment in Lao PDR

11because we move Tai-Kadai out from Lao -Tai Kadai to other ethnic subgroups.
Although seven minorities of Tai-Kadai is also classified as Lao Loum（Lowland Lao）,
but each of them have their own language and traditions which largely differs from
Lao. As we can observe that Tai-Kadai children are less likely to be enrolled than Laochildren, particularly for girls. All other ethnic subgroups also face disadvantage inaccess to schools, and the greatest obstacle is for Tibeto-Burman children. For an
example, a Tibeto-Burman girl is significantly less likely to attend school than a Laogirl by 48%.
Wealthier household is associated with a higher schooling probability, because itmeasures the ability to pay schooling costs and/or its desire to have more educatedchildren. However, the income effect is not strong in the case of rural Lao PDR.
Increasing log（per capita consumption）by one unit adds only 11% to the chance of achild going to school. It is of interest in this context to refer back to reasons why notsending a child to school. It is rare（less than 4%）that parent cite that a child had towork or school cost was too expensive. Besides, it can be said that the government has
been able to reduce tuition fee for households successfully as it comprises only a verysmall share of education expenditures（7% in urban areas and 3% in rural areas）.
Thus, living standards are seen to be less central to achieving universal primaryschool enrolments.
The proportion of household members who are young is associated with theschooling of any one child. It reflects the effect of schooling costs on households withmore children, as well as the trade-off that some parents make between having morechildren and investing more per child. In particular, our estimations show that themore school-aged children 6 to 14, whether boys or girls, a household has relative tothe number of its adults, the less likely is any child to be enrolled in school. Unlike theprevious study, we find that family size does matter for enrolment. An increase infamily size would reduce a probability of school attendance by roughly 2%. With
respect to parental characteristics, we find that parental education attainment
variables are related positively with a child s enrolment. The estimated coefficients ofparental education increase as the educational level rises. Both paternal and maternal
educations have a stronger impact for children of ethnic subgroups. Moreover, fathers
and mothers who work in non-farm activities are more likely to send their children to

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school, while the age of them do not appear to have any strong impact on schoolingdecision.
Turning now to the school availability, complete primary schools have a strong
effect on whether children are enrolled in school in all categories. Its effect is highly
positive for girls and ethnic subgroups by about 16%. In addition, the set of provincial
dummy variables will capture the geographical variation and heterogeneity, including
an area s ability to supply schools and the local demand for an educated labor force.
By setting urban area of Vientiane capital to be the reference, it is so hard to believethat the findings of the previous study that the school enrolments of 8 urban provinces
and 4 rural provinces are statistically significant better off than the capital. In our case,by setting rural area of Vientiane capital to be the reference, the results indicatedclearly that the school enrolments of 10 rural provinces（of which we later show as
low enrolment rate group）are significantly worse off than the capital. Children wholive in these regions are less likely to be enrolled in school by roughly 20% to 40%
relative to children in the capital. The remainder estimates of 7 rural provinces also
show negative signs, though not statistically significant（of which we later show ashigh enrolment rate group）.
Table 2: The Probability of Attending School for Rural Children 6-10, 2002/03
VariableChild Characteristics
Gender（Boy =1）
Age 7
Age 8
Age 9
Age 10Household Characteristics
Log（PCA）
Family Size
Share of Children 0-5
Share of Children 6-14
Tai-Kadai
Mon-Khmer
Tibeto-Burman
Hmong-Mien

All

Boy

Girl

Lao

Ethnics-0.0126（0.95）
0.0965**（8.54）
0.1333**（11.04）0.1512**（12.18）0.1627**（12.49）0.0992**（5.06）
0.2301**（9.25）
0.3322**（15.66）
0.3984**（22.37）0.4382**（26.92）0.0754**（4.31）-0.0123**（3.31）-0.0991（1.38）-0.1774**（2.72）

0.0879**（3.59）-0.0279**（5.85）-0.1511（1.55）-0.1883*（2.06）

0.0496**（3.66）
0.1870**（13.03）0.2610**（21.03）0.3063**（27.95）0.3322**（31.40）0.1991**（11.77）0.2530**（16.49）0.3083**（21.93）0.3243**（23.48）0.1698**（7.08）
0.2609**（12.85）0.2966**（16.71）0.3346**（19.92）0.1081**（6.30）-0.0236**（6.77）-0.0927（1.35）-0.1903**（3.00）-0.0482（1.87）-0.1294**（5.77）-0.3804**（7.48）-0.1638**（4.54）

0.1009**（4.25）-0.0226**（4.67）-0.0188（0.21）-0.2679**（3.19）-0.0023（0.07）-0.0964**（3.15）-0.2896**（3.92）-0.0734（1.58）

0.1079**（4.31）-0.0250**（4.88）-0.1426（1.35）-0.1106（1.16）-0.1062**（2.71）-0.1720**（5.34）-0.4765**（7.40）-0.2748**（5.30）

Revisiting the Determinants of Primary School Enrolment in Lao PDR

Table 2（Con d）
Father Characteristics
Some PrimaryCompleted Primary
Lower Secondary +Non-Farm
Age
Mother Characteristics
Some PrimaryCompleted Primary
Lower Secondary +Non-Farm
Age
School in Village
Complete PrimarySome Primary
Village Characteristics
North
Phongsaly
Luangnamtha
Oudomxay
Bokeo
Luangprabang
Huaphanh
Xayabury
CenterXiengkhuang
Vientiane
Borikhamxay
Khammuane
Savannakhet
Xaysomboun
South
Saravane
SekongChampasack
Attapeu
Observations
Pseduo R2

13

All

Boy

Girl

Lao

Ethnics

0.0492**（2.70）
0.1235**（6.66）
0.1460**（7.21）
0.0546**（2.86）-0.0043**（3.28）

0.478*（1.99）
0.1233**（4.97）
0.1656**（6.99）
0.0164（0.63）-0.0055**（3.15）

0.0442（1.59）
0.1205**（4.38）
0.1108**（3.27）
0.0964**（3.53）-0.0031（1.60）-0.0048（0.20）
0.0372（1.68）
0.0446*（1.96）
0.0158（0.94）-0.0009（0.66）

0.0911**（3.66）
0.1925**（7.51）
0.2368**（7.95）
0.1019**（3.54）-0.0057（2.98）

0.0572**（3.27）
0.0748**（3.50）
0.1115**（3.68）
0.0338（1.66）
0.0054**（3.41）

0.0288（1.19）
0.0631*（2.17）
0.0604（1.32）
0.0296（1.07）
0.0296**（2.79）

0.0915**（3.64）
0.0937**（3.04）
0.1844**（5.41）
0.0412（1.38）
0.0055**（2.40）

0.0459**（2.76）
0.0582**（3.15）
0.0776**（4.98）-0.0226（1.14）
0.0023（1.40）

0.0868**（3.52）
0.1186**（3.58）
0.1604**（2.86）
0.1128**（3.77）
0.0062**（2.71）

0.1161**（5.58）
0.0298（1.48）

0.0702*（2.43）
0.0138（0.50）

0.1633**（5.45）
0.0461（1.55）

0.0471*（2.19）
0.0122（0.60）

0.1681**（5.52）
0.0501（1.72）-0.2178（1.85）-0.4034**（3.65）-0.2965**（2.56）-0.2778*（2.38）-0.0990（0.95）-0.2951**（2.68）-0.2241*（1.97）-0.2580（1.50）-0.4276**（2.57）-0.2796（1.62）-0.3158（1.83）-0.1403（0.90）-0.2984（1.82）-0.1582（0.99）-0.2216（1.34）-0.4142**（2.82）-0.3540*（2.30）-0.2745（1.70）-0.0992（0.67）-0.3239*（2.16）-0.3250*（2.10）

0.0982**（7.46）-0.1455（1.79）
0.0098（0.23）-0.4241*（2.56）-0.5078**（3.96）-0.3610*（2.02）-0.3559*（1.96）-0.2169（1.07）-0.3495（1.88）-0.3775*（2.18）-0.0873（0.83）-0.0133（0.14）-0.0700（0.66）-0.1239（1.16）-0.3184**（2.88）-0.1297（1.11）-0.1842（1.11）-0.0683（0.46）-0.0583（0.39）-0.0897（0.61）-0.3260*（2.01）-0.1830（1.06）-0.0288（0.21）
0.0206（0.16）-0.1288（0.81）-0.2085（1.33）-0.3601*（2.39）-0.0803（0.48）-0.0043（0.09）
0.0359（0.93）
0.0606*（2.12）-0.0043（0.10）-0.1660*（2.28）-0.0311（0.49）-0.1425（0.69）-0.0707（0.34）-0.1533（0.74）-0.1532（0.74）-0.3998*（2.38）-0.1855（0.87）-0.4188**（3.94）-0.3175**（2.67）-0.1160（1.07）-0.3585**（3.14）
5,042
0.302-0.4197**（2.63）-0.2851（1.61）-0.0971（0.64）-0.3469*（2.03）
2,568
0.306-0.4592**（3.32）-0.3843*（2.45）-0.1913（1.20）-0.4188**（2.83）
2,474
0.316-0.1660*（2.28）-0.4956**（3.73）-0.3873*（2.26）
0.0013（0.01）-0.4287**（2.72）
3,095
0.260

Note: These are run as dprobits. Robust│Z│statistics are in parentheses.
* Significant at 5% level, ** at 1% level.

-0.0042（0.10）-0.1407（1.80）
1,947
0.288

Hmong-Mien

Tibeto-Burman

Mon-Khmer-0.0778**（2.63）-0.0443（1.23）-0.1114*（2.37）

0.0867**（4.08）-0.0175**（3.82）-0.2082*（2.24）-0.1555（1.75）-0.0264（0.77）-0.0659*（2.23）

0.1059**（2.90）-0.0248**（3.46）-0.1211（0.79）-0.0814（0.59）-0.0446（0.91）-0.1504**（3.67）-0.3381**（6.48）-0.1284*（2.07）

0.1942**（4.38）
0.3509**（9.54）
0.3731**（10.78）0.4524**（14.99）Low

0.0800**（4.61）-0.0118**（3.29）-0.0759（1.19）-0.1377*（2.12）-0.0139（1.04）
0.0542**（4.95）
0.0811**（6.52）
0.0948**（7.34）
0.1086**（7.39）

Lao
High

0.0729*（2.13）-0.0163*（2.21）-0.2632（1.67）-0.2503（1.88）

0.0023（0.08）
0.1815**（7.40）
0.2355**（10.54）0.2635**（11.86）0.2808**（12.71）Low

0.0618*（2.29）-0.0191**（3.17）-0.1882（1.53）-0.1066（0.87）

0.0475（1.89）
0.1582**（7.00）
0.1763**（8.29）
0.2454**（12.83）0.2638**（14.07）EthnicsHigh0.1192**（3.90）-0.0288**（5.04）-0.0792（0.65）-0.1492（1.36）

0.1209**（4.92）
0.2384**（6.47）
0.3861**（12.49）0.4526**（16.87）0.5090**（20.92）

Low

集

Tai-Kadai

0.1142**（3.20）-0.0282**（3.99）-0.0343（0.25）-0.3742*（3.06）
0.0394（0.90）-0.1050**（2.56）-0.2556**（4.14）-0.1059（1.54）

0.0916**（5.96）
0.1146**（7.00）
0.1445**（9.22）
0.1618**（9.32）

Girl
High

論

Share of Children 6-14

0.0764**（3.26）-0.0154**（3.00）-0.0094（0.11）-0.1144（1.23）-0.0093（0.33）-0.0488（1.72）

0.2771**（9.13）
0.3558**（13.67）0.4289**（19.66）0.4501**（21.39）Low

力

Share of Children 0-5

0.1137**（4.47）-0.0266**（5.33）-0.0943（0.91）-0.2101*（2.29）-0.0057（0.17）-0.1281**（4.38）-0.2979**（7.30）-0.1161*（2.52）

0.1029**（6.69）
0.1302**（8.38）
0.1675**（10.06）0.1826**（10.98）

Boy
High

協

Family Size

0.0843**（5.24）-0.0166**（4.75）-0.1178（1.78）-0.1385*（2.07）-0.0049（0.22）-0.0561**（2.69）

0.0884**（4.32）
0.2445**（9.24）
0.3623**（16.56）
0.4146**（21.79）0.4566**（26.07）

Low

際Household Characteristics
Log（PCA）

0.0092（0.68）
0.1023**（8.89）
0.1272**（11.04）0.1638**（14.28）0.1799**（14.99）

All
High

国

Age 10

Age 9

Age 8

Age 7

Child Characteristics
Gender（Boy=1）

Variable

Table 3: The Probability of Attending School for High Group and Low Group of Rural Children 6-10, 2002/03

14

第18巻 第１号

0.0125（0.56）
0.0055（0.26）
2,097
0.246

0.0227（1.33）
0.0611**（3.48）
0.0669**（2.80）
0.0238（1.25）
0.0029*（1.80）

0.0076（0.39）
0.0458*（2.43）
0.0513*（2.45）
0.0266（1.46）-0.0027*（2.00）

All
High

0.2043**（6.90）
0.0440（1.52）
2,942
0.266

0.0821**（3.08）
0.0872*（2.57）
0.1436**（2.89）
0.0544（1.76）
0.0059**（2.57）

0.0792**（2.87）
0.1911**（6.70）
0.2341**（7.37）
0.0612*（2.04）-0.0048*（2.50）

Low

0.0095（0.33）
0.0131（0.47）
1,070
0.249-0.0047（0.18）
0.0614*（2.55）
0.0158（0.34）
0.0426*（1.97）
0.0045*（1.97）

0.0178（0.70）
0.0352（1.37）
0.0749**（3.09）-0.0316（1.13）-0.0035（1.91）

Boy
High

0.1410**（3.33）
0.0146（0.36）
1,496
0.281

0.0525（1.41）
0.0543（1.14）
0.1196（1.76）
0.0199（0.45）
0.0048（1.50）

0.0782*（2.13）
0.2067**（5.40）
0.2413**（6.12）
0.0619（1.57）-0.0054*（2.08）

Low

Note: These are run as dprobits. Robust│Z│statistics are in parentheses.
* Significant at 5% level, ** at 1% level.

Observations
Pseduo R2

Some Primary

School in Village
Complete Primary

Age

Non-Farm

Lower Secondary+Completed Primary

Mother Characteristics
Some Primary

Age

Non-Farm

Lower Secondary+Completed Primary

Father Characteristics
Some Primary

Table 3（Con d）

0.0199（0.64）
0.0013（0.04）
1,027
0.281

0.0522*（2.55）
0.0610**（2.66）
0.1078**（6.69）-0.0015（0.05）
0.0013（0.58）-0.0091（0.33）
0.0461（1.85）
0.0060（0.17）
0.0749**（3.40）-0.0015（0.82）

Girl
High

0.2656**（6.35）
0.0742（1.79）
1,446
0.260

0.1133**（2.96）
0.1304**（2.66）
0.1872**（2.63）
0.0869*（2.02）
0.0080*（2.44）

0.0790（1.93）
0.1752**（4.19）
0.2245**（4.51）
0.0534（1.17）-0.0045（1.56）

Low

0.0042（0.21）
0.0017（0.09）
1,072
0.254

0.0202（1.18）
0.0309（1.66）
0.0401*（2.16）
0.0029（0.17）
0.0021（1.21）

0.0189（0.96）
0.0306（1.43）
0.0269（1.18）
0.0097（0.56）-0.0024（1.72）

Lao
High

0.1887**（3.83）
0.0321（0.70）
875
0.267

0.0855*（2.45）
0.1234**（3.57）
0.1433**（4.65）-0.0358（0.86）
0.0006（0.19）-0.0765（1.40）
0.0340（0.71）
0.0764（1.64）
0.0355（1.01）
0.0022（0.83）

Low

0.0544（1.30）
0.0262（0.64）
1,028
0.216

0.0315（1.06）
0.1252**（4.23）
0.1437**（3.20）
0.0695（1.91）
0.0036（1.20）

0.0045（0.14）
0.0688*（2.16）
0.0951**（2.65）
0.0494（1.42）-0.0025（1.01）

Ethnics
High

0.1992**（5.38）
0.0383（1.15）
2,067
0.223

0.1208**（3.86）
0.1059**（2.35）
0.1491*（1.97）
0.1561**（4.26）
0.0061*（2.16）

0.1379**（4.48）
0.2646**（8.03）
0.3244**（8.10）
0.0892*（2.31）-0.0064**（2.67）

Low

Revisiting the Determinants of Primary School Enrolment in Lao PDR
15

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4.2. High vs. Low Enrolment Rate GroupIn this subsection, we focus on the results for high and low enrolment rate groupas shown in Table 3. We find some more striking and important differences between
these two groups, especially for Lao and（non-Lao）ethnic subgroups. For all children,enrolment peaks at age 10 relative to the official entry age of six, but it is the case for
only 18% in high group as compared with 46% in low group. We find a much later age
of entry into school than the previous study. The pattern of indifference in delayed
enrolment rate between boy and girl, but a large difference across Lao and otherethnic subgroups remain the same. Interestingly, we find that girls are no less likely to
be enrolled than boys in high group. The gender disparity only exists among ethnic
subgroups by 5% in high group and 12% in low group. This new finding is very
important for policy makers who concern about gender issue on equitable access toschools.
Related to household characteristics of family income, household size, the age
proportion of household and ethnic affiliation, most patterns discussed above remain
the same, except for that the estimates of each variable are generally lower for highgroup than those for low group. For an example, increasing log（per capita
consumption）by one unit adds 8% and 11% to the probability of a child going toschool in high and low group, respectively. These things, again, reflect a number ofdifferences in local economic and social conditions across provinces.
With respect to parental characteristics, we find that parental education
attainments are related positively with a child s enrolment in both groups. However,
the educations of both father and mother have a much more pronounced andsignificant effect in low group than in high group. It is of particular interest to observethat having parents with some primary education level can increase the probability of
sending a child to school in low group, while this is not so in the case of high group.
This new finding gives very important information for policy makers to plan for theappropriate level of adult literacy/education campaign in each area. In addition, related
to the school supply, complete primary schools have a very strong effect on whether
children are enrolled in school in low group, but not in high group. Children who live
in a village with a complete primary school in low group are more likely to be enrolled
in school by 20% than those do not.

Revisiting the Determinants of Primary School Enrolment in Lao PDR

17

5. Conclusions
Over the past few decades, Lao PDR has achieved steady progress in educational
outcomes across the different groups of the population. According to recent
educational statistics, the net enrolment rate of children aged 6 to 10 has improved
from 86.4% in 2006/07 to 89.2% in 2007/08. However, significant challenges still lie
ahead. First, the size of the population of school age continues to rise, requiring acontinued expansion in the number of school supplies, especially complete primaryschools. The number of children aged 6 has grown by about 5% over the period of
2006-2008. Second, past progress has been mostly about increasing access to educationand much less about improving quality of education. The challenge is to enroll children
in school timely and to keep them in school long enough. Only 113,132 children out of
151,185 populations aged 6 or 75% have been enrolled in school timely in 2007/08.
While the drop out rate of grade 1 has been reduced to about 11%, the grade
repetition rate remains very high about 32% as compared to 7% and 4% for grade 5,
respectively.
As discussed earlier, this study shows that educational progress in rural Lao PDR
has not been equal across groups. We find significant disparities according to a child s
residence（high group vs. low group）and ethno-linguistic affiliation. In general,gender and income attributes are less important issues. In particular, rural ethnic
subgroups in low enrolment rate provinces have lagged farthest behind other groups.
In explaining enrolments, we find that parental schoolings and the supply of complete
primary schools are helpful factors to increase the probability of a child to be enrolled
in school. These findings imply that policy interventions to achieve universal primaryeducation should be carefully tailored to the specific obstacles and needs facing eachgroup.

Notes
１ The official name is Lao People s Democratic Republic. We define Lao as the country and language,and italic Lao as the major population group.
２ Lao PDR is a very ethnically diverse country（49 different subgroups）, especially in the north and thewestern（NSC, 2004）. In view of this diversity, we subdivide the geographical and gender groups byethno-linguistic affiliation − Lao , the majority group accounting for 55% of the population, andethnics , which includes the Tai-Kadai（10%）, Mon-Khmer（23%）, Tibeto-Burman（3%）, Hmong-Mien（9%）. We exclude other smaller groups（1%）from the analysis.

18

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第18巻 第１号

３ We subdivide all rural areas of 18 provinces into High enrolment rate group and Low enrolment
rate group based on the comparison after running several regressions. Simply High group include
eight provinces of Luangprabang（North）; Xiengkhuang, Vientiane Capital, Vientiane, Borikhamxay,
Khammuane, Xaysomboun SR（Central）; and Champasack（South）. Simply Low group include ten
provinces of Phongsaly, Luangnamtha, Oudomxay, Bokeo, Huaphanh, Xayabury（North）; Savannakhet（Central）;and Saravane, Sekong and Attapeu（South）.
４ Although compulsory education of primary cycle has not been accomplished yet, a ninth grade will be
added to lower secondary education from school year 2010/11. Thus, the basic education system will
become 5+4+3, instead of 5+3+3（MOE, 2005）.
５ The public expenditure on education of Asia-Pacific 21 developing countries average stands about 4.7%
of GDP and 16.2% of total government expenditure. Lao PDR invests about US$9.9 per student in the
primary cycle, US$13.7 in lower secondary, US$22.7 in upper secondary, US$173.3 in teacher education,and US$122.7 in higher education in 2004. This finding suggests that there is ample scope for a better
redistribution of resources（World Bank, 2007）.

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