Saturday, May 27, 2017

The Irrawaddy Magazine

The Irrawaddy Magazine

The Irrawaddy Business Roundup (May 27)

Posted: 27 May 2017 12:53 AM PDT

Logistics Warehouse to Open in Thilawa SEZ

A modern logistics warehouse has been completed at the Thilawa Special Economic Zone and will begin operations on June 1.

The facility is operated by Nittsu Logistics Myanmar, whose services include warehousing, air/ocean cargo forwarding, customs clearance, domestic distribution (including bonded transport), cross-border truck transport and heavy haulage.

The new warehouse with temperature controlled and dehumidified spaces will offer facilities for the storage of products such as apparel and chemical products that require temperature controlled and an anti-fungal environment, according to a trade journal.

The facility will offer bonded storage services utilizing bonded cargo functions that are unavailable elsewhere in Burma, according to the report.

Plans to expand the cargo terminal at Thilawa port and to widen roads near the zone raise the possibility that the Thilawa economic zone will become a significant production and logistics hub, the report added.

Coca-Cola Welcomes New Chief in Burma

Coca-Cola Pinya Beverages, the bottling operation of the global drinks giant in Burma, has a new head, according to a company announcement.

Gaurav Chaturvedi previously served as an executive director for human resources at Hindustan Coca-Cola Beverages, one of India's largest manufacturing and distribution companies in the fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) sector.

Chaturvedi is one of 13 associates of Hindustan Coca-Cola who are working in senior executive positions for the company outside India, including in Burma.

The Burma plant is based in Rangoon's Hmawbi Township and opened in 2013 with a planned investment of US$200 million and a target to create 22,000 jobs over five years.

Trucking-Shipping Route Slashes Export Delivery Time

A new ground-sea route which cuts delivery times from Burma to major markets was started this month by Nisshin Transportation, a unit of Hitachi Transport System, Nikkei Asia reported.

The service is geared to the textile industry. Goods go first by land between Yangon and Bangkok. Nisshin Transportation has created a trans-shipment site to rearrange cargo on trucks at Myawaddy on the border with Thailand. After the goods arrive in Bangkok they are shipped to China and Japan.

The service cuts the transport time for goods between Rangoon and Japan or China to about one month, compared to around two months for goods traveling the sea-only route via the Strait of Malacca.

Burma has a growing sewing and garments industry and quicker transport systems can bolster its position as a hub for women's clothing and other items that require fast delivery, according to the report.

Burma's Air Services See Sharp Rise

The number of air passengers in Burma has more than doubled in two years, according to a report in an industry publication.

Data from the air travel intelligence firm OAG indicates that seat capacity at Burma's airports was twice as high in 2016 as in 2014, according to the report.

Rangoon International Airport has accounted for roughly half of all scheduled seat capacity for more than a decade, the report said.

Last year the airport handled around six million passengers, it added.

After Rangoon, Burma's most used airports are Mandalay and Heho. Domestic air travel is dominated by flights from Rangoon to other airports, with Mandalay and Heho served with at least 10 daily flights.

The capital Naypyidaw comes only fifth for passenger numbers, with just two international services, to Bangkok and Kunming.

The two leading international services linked to Burma are to Bangkok's two airports. There are more than 90 weekly flights to Suvarnabhumi airport and 63 weekly flights to Don Muang airport. Singapore's Changi airport is served by about 57 weekly flights.

Other international destinations served by direct flights from Burma include airports in Cambodia, China, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, South Korea, the United Arab Emirates and Vietnam.

The OAG data indicated that of Burma's top 15 airlines (by seats), nine are locally based. "Going forward it seems unlikely that the country can sustain as many as nine local airlines, but while Myanmar [Burma] is developing rapidly there are clearly opportunities," the report said.

DICA Approves 25 Investments this Month

A total of 25 local and foreign investments were approved so far this month by the Directorate of Investment and Company Administration (DICA).

The approved companies include seven in the cut-manufacture-pack (CMP) garment sector, while others were in agriculture, construction and telecommunications, according to an official.

"We will give priority to investments which can create job opportunities," the official told The Global New Light of Myanmar.

DICA is in discussions with state and regional governments on how to stimulate investments in other industrial sectors besides the garment industry, the report said.

South Korea to Send Buses

South Korea's trade promotion agency said two hundred buses will be exported to Burma for use by public schools, according to Yonhap news agency.

The 29-seat Hyundai buses will be shipped next month in a deal between the Yangon Regional Government and the Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency (KOTRA).

"The deal marks South Korea's first government-to-government contract with an Asian country. It also involves South Korean trading firm POSCO Daewoo International Co. and a local operator," according to the report.

Bankers Set for Training in Thailand

A leadership program for banking executives will help build skills and deepen knowledge in Burma's banking sector, according to organizers Siam Commercial Bank (SCB) and Thammasat University in Thailand, together with the Myanmar Banks Association.

The "Myanmar Banker Leadership Program" is the first program developed exclusively for Burmese banking executives, according to SCB in a statement.

"With a rapidly developing economy and changing business landscape, the banking industry requires strong leadership and trained employees to drive banks into the new financial future," the statement said. SCB expects the program to be a "must attend" for Burma's rising financial leaders, the press release added.

The first round of the six-week program will include around 30 banking executives from private and public banks. Different curricula are offered for young executives and senior executives.

Subjects include financial analysis and credit risk management, trade finance, foreign exchange, money market management and portfolio management.

"Since establishing our presence in Myanmar in 2012, SCB has been keen to contribute to the Myanmar government effort to help improve the financial sector," said Kamalkant Agarwal, Head of International Banking, SCB.

The post The Irrawaddy Business Roundup (May 27) appeared first on The Irrawaddy.

This Week in Parliament (May 22-26)

Posted: 26 May 2017 10:01 PM PDT

Monday (May 22)

The Lower House approved a proposal from Thabaung Township lawmaker U Thein Tun to increase the tax the on the use of land, irrigation water, and reservoirs to a rate that does not cause a burden to farmers. According to the lawmaker, the taxes have not been increased in more than eight decades.

U Soe Nyunt, a judge of the Union Supreme Court, extended apologies to lawmakers for accusing them of holding the court in contempt. Earlier, the judge, in response to a Waw Township lawmaker's proposal on March 7 urging the Union Supreme Court to fix the "corrupt" judicial system, said such an accusation amounted to contempt of court. Lawmakers, however, approved the proposal, which allows the Parliament to oversee the judicial system.

Tuesday (May 23)

The Union Parliament received the President's proposal to continue Burma's membership in 2017 Regional Cooperative Agreement (2017 RCA) which replaced the 1978 Regional Cooperative Agreement for Research, Development and Training related to Nuclear Science and Technology for Asia and the Pacific (1978 RCA).

The Parliament approved the President's proposal to sign the Indian Ocean Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Port State Control.

Two lawmakers discussed the President's proposal to obtain a US$125 loan from the World Bank to implement the South East Asia Disaster Risk Management Project, of which US$77 million is earmarked for the prevention of urban flooding in the commercial capital of Rangoon.

Nineteen lawmakers discussed the President's proposal to sign the agreement for the establishment of the Asean Forest Cooperation Organization.

Wednesday (May 24)

There was no session in either of the two houses, as lawmakers attended the second 21st Century Panglong Peace Conference which convened in Naypyidaw.

Thursday (May 25)

To dismay of lower-level civil servants, Deputy Minister for Planning and Finance U Maung Maung Maung Win told Mingin Township's lawmaker U Maung Myint in the Lower House that the government had no plan so far to increase the pay for civil servants. The deputy minister however said that the government was implementing other measures to contribute to the welfare of civil servants, such as the sale of apartments in installments and increasing overtime pay and other allowances.

The Parliament also approved a proposal from Hlaingbwe Township lawmaker U Khin Cho urging the government to adopt strategies to address the country's unemployment problem. According to the lawmaker, Burma has over 32.98 million people aged between 15 and 64, but just 66 percent are working.

In the Upper House, Daw Khin Swe Lwin of Chin State Constituency (9) asked if the government could provide small and medium enterprises (SME) in Chin State with access to international loans for their development.

Union Minister for Industry U Khin Maung Cho said that the government had obtained a loan of around 50 billion kyats intended for SME development from the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), and provided 41.558 billion kyats to 186 SMEs in 10 divisions and states; and that businesses in Chin State could ask for the loans from the remaining 8.442 billion kyats through the state government.

Friday (May 26)

There was no session in either house.

The post This Week in Parliament (May 22-26) appeared first on The Irrawaddy.

Displaced by Violence, Kaman Yearn for Home as Hopes Dim

Posted: 26 May 2017 09:24 PM PDT

RANGOON — After retiring from the army in Oct. 2011, Saw Aung returned to his family home in Arakan State's Ramree Township. He was 73 at the time.

But the idyll of his golden years was short-lived.

One year after returning, his home was burned to the ground amid communal violence between Arakan Buddhists and Muslims in Ramree, part of a wave of clashes that swept the state and left hundreds dead in separate incidents throughout 2012.

He and his family were sent to a refugee camp, where they lived for four years.

"Although there were some members of the army, police and administrative bodies there, no one tried to stop the fire," Saw Aung recalled during a press conference at the Royal Rose restaurant in Rangoon in late April.

Saw Aung is Kaman, the only ethnic group of Muslims recognized by Burma's government. Before 2012, the Kaman, who number in the tens of thousands, enjoyed considerably more rights than the Rohingya, a persecuted Muslim minority of about 1 million people who were stripped of their citizenship in 1982 and deemed newcomers from Bangladesh.

But after the violence, the Kaman struggled with some of the same problems facing the Rohingya, who make up most of the more than 120,000 people still living in IDP camps in Arakan.

Though they could vote in the 2015 election that brought pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi to power, many Kaman find it difficult to this day to gain national identity cards, a crucial requirement for freedom of movement.

While they have tried at times to distance themselves from the Rohingya, they face discrimination regardless and some have been accused of trying to fake their own identity to get proper documents.

In a cruel twist, the plight of the Kaman is often overlooked by the international community, who have focused intensely on the much larger Rohingya crisis, especially since a brutal crackdown on Rohingya Muslim militants began in October following attacks on police border guard posts.

Members of the Kaman community gathered at the Rose Restaurant to raise concerns about their rights and call for resettlement.

After his house was destroyed, Saw Aung and two relatives lived in a small room at the refugee camp in Ramree that sheltered more than 700 people. It flooded during the rainy season. Fed up with the conditions many in the camp later moved in with relatives in other cities in Burma. Saw Aung and his family went to Rangoon.

Tun Myint, another Kaman man who spoke at the Royal Rose, said more than 1,000 men holding swords had surrounded his village in 2012. But he escaped the mob, hiding in a pigsty owned by Arakan Buddhist friends.

"This is a proof of our close relationship with Arakan people. They also protected us from the attackers," he said.

Although he felt well off and comfortable in Ramree, Tun Myint had his share of misfortune after 2012. He moved to a refugee camp for three years before taking his family to Rangoon, where he struggled financially.

"We had to live in a bamboo house for more than one year in Rangoon, although we had an ordinary life in Ramree. My sons had to live separately from their wives, and we became homeless people," he said.

Religious Oppression a Factor?

The Kaman are Muslim, but they share many cultural and traditional traits with their Arakan Buddhist neighbors, leaving them sometimes stuck in the middle of an enduring conflict.

They continue to be oppressed because of their faith, said Tin Win Hlaing, secretary of the Kaman National Progressive Party.

"We, Kaman people, were treated unlawfully. We have spent five years of our time at the camps without regard from two successive governments," he said, referring to the new administration of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and the previous military-backed President Thein Sein, who was at the helm as Burma launched reforms in 2011.

The Kaman should receive better treatment, Tin Win Hlaing argued, because they are "one of Burma's 135 ethnic races."

Situations at Refugee Camps

The Kaman have lived mostly in Arakan in the townships of Sittwe, Thandwe, Ramree and Kyaukphyu.

They were targeted in 2012 and many now live in refugee camps. There are 600 Kaman in a camp near Tan village in Ramree and 1,115 close to Kyauktalone village in Kyaukphyu.

Maung Phyu Shae is from Kyaukphyu but moved to the Kyauktalone camp when riots broke out in Oct. 2012, the second of two major clashes that year. He thought it might be temporary, but he and his family are still there.

The education of his children suffered and his family members could not get work, circumstances that are also rife in Rohingya camps in central and northern Arakan.

His family members have been living in a tarpaulin tent for five years. They have little hope of returning home.

"We do not get a daily income of [more than] 500 kyats for more than five years at the camp," he said.

Although the situation has stabilized in Kyaukphyu, the authorities say the Kaman cannot go back, citing security concerns. Instead, they want the displaced Kaman to set up new residential wards near Kyaukphyu, using plots set aside for families, Maung Phyu Shae said.

He thinks this is unnecessary.

"No one disturbed us when we went to Kyaukphyu. Extremist Arakan people in previous riots were the strangers. The local Arakan people and Kaman people have been living in peaceful coexistence for centuries," he said.

Tun Ngwe, chairman of the Kaman Social Network, a civil society organization, said community representatives held talks with officials from the Ministry of Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement in Sittwe Township on May 6, and reached an agreement for the return of 65 families from Ramree camp.

But refugees from the Kyauktalone camp have not been allowed to do the same thus far.

"When we asked authorities to go back to our native land that was allocated by an ancient king, they promised to rebuild new homes for refugees," Tun Ngwe said.

The post Displaced by Violence, Kaman Yearn for Home as Hopes Dim appeared first on The Irrawaddy.
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