At least 5 million hectares of Laos's total land area of 23,680,000 hectares are suitable for cultivation (about 21 percent). 17 percent of this land area (between 850,000 and 900,000 hectares) is actually cultivated, less than 4 percent of the total area.
Rice accounted for about 80 percent of cultivated land during the 1989- 90 growing season, including 422,000 hectares of lowland wet rice and 223,000 hectares of upland rice. This demonstrates that although there is interplanting of upland crops and fish are found in fields, irrigated rice agriculture remains basically a monoculture system despite government efforts to encourage crop diversification.