BURMA
Deep-sea ventures
Officials in Burma and Thailand are planning to develop a new deepwater port near Dawei, a port city in the Taninthanyi division, south of Rangoon. In November, an initial agreement was signed between the Burmese authorities and a joint Italian-Thai company. As things stand, this and related projects are to be completed in three phases over the course of a decade, at a cost of USD 13 billion.
The project is part of a larger plan to set up a full-fledged industrial zone around Dawei, the first such in Burma. This would include establishing new road and rail links, to connect the Dawei seaport to the mainland and onward, all the way to the Burma-Thailand border. In addition, the industrial zone is envisioned to house an oil refinery and petrochemical industries, and the hub of a new oil-pipeline network. Plans for a second seaport are also in the works; this would be located near Kyaukphyu, on the northern tip of Ramree Island (also known as Yangbye), off of Rakhine state in the Bay of Bengal. This would serve as a transit base for goods headed for Chittagong, Rangoon and Kolkata.
Once Dawei becomes functional, cargo ships from the Gulf, Africa and Europe can offload their goods there, which can be transported to Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and even China, if the road network which is part of the Dawei project extends all the way there. The Strait of Malacca, notorious for its massive shipping traffic, may see a gradual decline as Dawei gears up for business. In 2004, India helped the Burmese authorities to conduct a study to assess whether the project was feasible. The results were positive, and now the sub-regional economic grouping BIMSTEC (Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation) has put the Dawei seaport on its list of 'high-priority' projects.