Hydropower development brings economic benefits such as increased government revenues. These benefits are located at the national level. Government strategies, such as Lao PDR's NGPES (2003), envisage these economic benefits trickling-down' and increasing socio-economic development through, amongst others increasing the amount of money the government can spend on poverty reduction programmes. However, hydropower development can have social and environmental dis-benefits. In the case of the lower Mekong, this is mainly in terms of hydropower's impact on fisheries and the livelihoods that depend on them.