The results are not far from those found in the literature and illustrate the great deal of churning and experimentation that goes on among Lao exporters: close to half of all firms and products and close to three quarters of FPD units last only one year. Because of censoring, we cannot tell how many of the 9.3 percent of firms (105) which appear in all four years could have lasted for another year or continued on from 2005 (making them last five or six years), it is still surprising how few of them succeed in exporting over the medium term.

**Table 4:** Number of years a unit is present in the data (2006-2009)

|**Active**|**Fir**<br>**Freq.**|**ms**<br>**%**|**Prod**<br>**Freq.**|**ucts**|**Destin**<br>**Freq.**|**ations**<br>**%**|**Firm**<br>**Freq.**|**-Prod**<br>**%**|**Firm**<br>**Freq.**|**-Dest**<br>**%**|**Prod**<br>**Freq.**|**-Dest**<br>**%**|**F-**<br>**Freq.**|**P-D**<br>**%**|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|**1year**|619|55.0**%**|451|49.1**%**|34|37.0**%**|2,535|71.7**%**|1,268|61.5**%**|1,383|62.5**%**|3,754|74.4**%**|
|**2years**|240|21.3**%**|205|22.3**%**|18|19.6**%**|642|18.1**%**|449|21.8**%**|469|21.2**%**|916|18.2**%**|
|**3years**|161|14.3**%**|161|17.5**%**|20|21.7**%**|274|7.70**%**|228|11.1**%**|261|11.8**%**|293|5.81**%**|
|**4years**|105|9.33**%**|101|11.0**%**|20|21.7**%**|86|2.40**%**|115|5.6**%**|100|4.52**%**|82|1.63**%**|
|**Total**|1,125||918||92||3,537||2,060||2,213||5,045||
|**Mean**|1.78||1.9||2.3||1.4||1.6||1.6||1.4||
|**Std dev**|1.01||1.1||1.2||0.7||0.9||0.9||0.7||
|**Median**|1||2||2||1||1||1||1||

_Source:_ Authors‟ calculation based on Lao PDR customs data

**Table 5:** The number of years an FPD is present in the data, by destination and sector

|**Country**|**#FPDs**|**1year**|**2yrs**|**3yrs**|**4yrs**|**Sector**|**#FPDs**|**1year**|**2yrs**|**3yrs**|**4yrs**|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|**Thailand**|2426|72.1%|20.5%|5.3%|2.1%|**Garment/footwear**|1988|72.3%|21.8%|5.6%|0.3%|
|**Vietnam**|737|74.8%|19.1%|3.8%|2.3%|**Wood**|1142|72.5%|18.5%|6.2%|2.8%|
|**France**|235|64.7%|25.1%|8.9%|1.3%|**Others**|1004|79.3%|13.4%|5.9%|1.5%|
|**China**|188|89.4%|7.5%|3.2%|0.0%|**Agriculture**|653|75.5%|15.6%|5.2%|3.7%|
|**Great Britain**|149|67.8%|19.5%|12.8%|0.0%|**Metals**|145|79.3%|13.1%|6.2%|1.4%|
|**United States**|140|75.0%|16.4%|8.6%|0.0%|**Minerals**|110|74.6%|15.5%|7.3%|2.7%|
|**Germany**|127|79.5%|10.2%|9.5%|0.8%|||||||
|**Japan**|118|67.0%|16.1%|13.6%|3.4%|||||||

_Source:_ Authors‟ calculation based on Lao PDR customs data The same information, for FPDs, can be seen in Table 5, this time disaggregated by sector and destination. The results are quite uniform overall, with no outliers. Concerning destinations, China has the highest percentage of FPDs surviving only one year (~90 percent) and Japan the lowest (67 percent). Japan is also the destination with the highest percentage of long-lived export links (3.4 percent of the FPDs appear in all the four years), whereas China, the US and the EU members have almost no FPDs older than three years. Agriculture has the highest percentage of its FPDs (3.7) lasting 4 years, while the garment and footwear industry has the lowest (0.3 percent), but the sectors seem to be very similar in terms of survival characteristics.

_Exporting from a small landlocked economy_ _13_