Slaughterhouses at local level will be supplied by traders, but in districts where there is low demand, the slaughterhouse owners will go to the villages to purchase livestock directly. Most local slaughterhouses will slaughter up to 3 or 4 head per day, with the quantities in Pakse being much higher due to greater demand for meat in that area. In Vientiane slaughterhouses, the volume of cattle traded by individual supplies varies from 2 head per day for Nongduang slaughterhouse, up to 30 head per day for the largest trader supplying Dondu slaughterhouse.

Abattoir design, construction, and operation are traditional and do not meet regulations for hygiene, environment, and animal welfare. Observations of existing provincial and district abattoirs identified several features that are critically noncompliant to food safety, including unsealed, cracked, and broken cement slaughter floors; wooden butchery benches; open air facilities without insect screens; inadequate drainage and treatment of waste; unsanitary water used in cleaning and processing; inadequate separation of live animal, slaughtering, and processing; inadequate lighting; inadequate provision for animal welfare (holding pens, drinking water); soil contamination from unsealed transport access; absence of chilling and cold chain; inadequate cleaning operations; and absence of records of daily cleaning.