Myanmar

With over a fourth of it’s population under the poverty line, rampant inflation coupled with poor economic and political planning leave the people of Myanmar with little hope of escaping their status as one of the poorest countries in the world. Myanmar’s economy is largely based on its rich agriculture. Two thirds of its population finds work in the fields, yet poor farming techniques and very limited technological improvements leave the majority of Myanmar’s farmers engaging in nothing more than subsistence agriculture. Rice is Myanmar’s staple crop, which provides little nutritional value for its subsistence farmers. Apart from it’s agricultural industry, many of Myanmar’s citizens find work in the corrupt public sector. The pay is extremely poor for most civil servants, ranging from under $2.00 USD to $7.00 USD a month.

Taking a closer look at Myanmar’s fiscal instability, high inflation rates and a growing deficit are two major economic opponents to solving poverty in Myanmar. With little money, comes little ability to tackle the developmental problems that plague the social infrastructure of Myanmar. Risky behaviors such as promiscuous sex and high drug incidence are inevitable in areas of high poverty and are unavoidable without proper political intervention, which cannot be afforded.

Child labor is rampant in Myanmar, with 4 million out of its 11.8 million youth between the ages of 6-16 working. Most of these children, who are working in their family’s farms, make just enough food to survive. Children who have to substitute their education for necessary work, limit their opportunities for developing trade skills that help them escape the perils of subsistence farming, creating a vicious cycle that only perpetuates Myanmar’s poverty stricken population.

Unfortunately, Myanmar, formally known as Burma, continues to be one of the most repressive countries in Asia, even with promises for political reform and national reconciliation by its authoritarian military government, the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC). The SPDC restricts the basic rights and freedoms of all Burmese. It continues to attack and harass democratic leader Aung San Suu Kyi, still under house arrest, and the political movement that she represents. It also continues to use internationally outlawed tactics in ongoing conflicts with ethnic minority rebel groups.

In 2002, the International Committee of the Red Cross reported there were approximately 3,500 “security detainees” within the country. Of these, at least 1,300 were believed to be political prisoners, including elected members of parliament. Most, if not all, were arbitrarily arrested for exercising their freedoms of opinion and expression. The right to a fair trial, as well as the right to lawyer, continues to be denied to most detainees, in particular those accused of political dissent. Torture and mistreatment of detainees is common, especially during pre-trial detention in military intelligence interrogation centers. Authorities continue to extend the detention of political prisoners who have served their prison sentences by placing them under “administrative detention.”

Myanmar has more child soldiers than any other country in the world, accounting for approximately one-fourth of the 300,000 children currently believed to be participating in armed conflicts across the globe. A 2002 investigation found that as many as seventy thousand children under the age of eighteen may be serving in Myanmar’s national armed forces. Armed opposition groups in Myanmar also recruit child soldiers, although on a much smaller scale. These forces have used extrajudicial execution, rape, torture, forced relocation of villages, and forced labor in campaigns against rebel groups. Ethnic minority forces have also committed abuses, though not on the scale committed by government forces.

Although the government of Myanmar still denies such systematic recruitment, it has for the first time acknowledged child soldiers in the army as an issue. Largely as a result of an October 2003 report to the United Nations Security Council by Secretary General Kofi Annan, the government formed a high-level “Committee to Prevent the Recruitment of Child Soldiers,” and announced that a task force was being formed to ensure inspections for underage recruitment. The army continues to commit gross abuses against civilians, particularly members of ethnic minorities associated with various resistance movements in the country. In its campaigns against ethnic minorities, the army engages in summary executions, torture, and rape of women and girls.

The SPDC’s eight-year campaign of forcibly relocating minority ethnic groups has destroyed nearly three thousand villages, particularly in areas of active ethnic insurgency and areas targeted for economic development. Hundreds of thousands of ethnic minorities have been forced into as many as 200 internment centers, and those who have passed through these sites report forced labor, extrajudicial executions, rape, and torture committed by government troops. There are an estimated one million internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Myanmar, and several hundred thousand refugees in Bangladesh, India, Malaysia, and especially neighboring Thailand. The government has refused international access to areas of ongoing conflict, cutting off humanitarian assistance to IDPs in violation of international humanitarian law. The army continues to confiscate, without adequate compensation, large tracts of land owned by civilians and to take civilians for forced labor. During October and November communal violence by Buddhists against Muslims was reported in Mandalay and Yangon Divisions. Muslims were killed and their property destroyed.

Smallpox and plague have been almost completely eliminated as health hazards from Myanmar and programs are under way to eradicate malaria and tuberculosis. However, gastrointestinal diseases such as typhoid, dysentery, and cholera remain prevalent. One of the problems yet to be overcome is the lack of potable water for residents; only 68% of the population had access to safe drinking water and 46% had adequate sanitation. Another serious health problem is drug addiction, exacerbated by the easy availability and low cost of opium. Under a drug abuse control program financed by the United States and the UN, a new 300-bed hospital for addicts opened in 1982 at Thayetmyo, along the Irrawaddy in central Myanmar; smaller facilities have been established in about two dozen other towns.

There were 1,093 new cases of AIDS in 1996; that year, international health organizations estimated the number of Myanmar infected in the north alone to be 350,000–400,000. The HIV prevalence as of 1999 was 1.99 per 100 adults.

Myanmar’s limited prevention efforts led HIV to spread freely—at first within the most at-risk groups and later beyond them. Consequently, Myanmar has one of the most serious HIV epidemics in the region, with HIV prevalence among pregnant women estimated at 1.8% in 2004. In East Asia and the Pacific, Cambodia, Myanmar and Thailand have the highest infection rates and are the only countries in the region with HIV prevalence greater than 1 per cent among youth.

Within Myanmar, production of electricity in recent years totaled 49,310 million kWh, of which thermal plants provided about 83% and hydroelectric power roughly 17%. Electric power capacity rose to 1,458 MW in 2001, but power supply remains inadequate to meet the country's needs and shortages are on the rise across the country. With the exception of precious gemstones, of which Myanmar had large resources, mineral production was small, and mostly for domestic consumption. The mining sector, including oil and gas, contributed 2% of Myanmar’s gross domestic product in 2001. Copper, tin, tungsten, iron, construction materials, and fertilizer were among the country's leading industries in 2002; precious stones ranked fourth among export commodities, supplying 2% of export earnings.

Forests and woodland cover nearly half the country, even though the annual deforestation rate was 0.68% between the years 1975 and 1989. Some 38% of the forest was transformed into Reserved Forest Area in 2001. Myanmar has a major share of the world's teak reserves, which constitute about one-third of the forested area. As the world's leading exporter of teak, Myanmar supplies about 75% of the world market.

Myanmar is one of the few developing nations that are a net exporter of food, which accounts for 20% of its foreign exchange earnings. About 15% of the land is under cultivation and agriculture generates roughly two-thirds of employment and 42% of recorded gross domestic product.

Rice, by far the most important agricultural product, covers about 5.5 million hectares (13.5 million acres) of land in the fertile Irrawaddy delta region, the lower valleys of the Sittang and Salween rivers, and along the Arakan and Tenasserim coasts. Other crops grown mainly in central Myanmar and the state of Shan, included 5,429,000 tons of sugarcane, 562,000 tons of groundnuts, 303,000 tons of corn, and 210,000 tons of sesame.

In Myanmar, education is free, although informal fees were increasingly imposed in the late 1990s. Primary education is compulsory for five years, although observers estimate that between two-thirds and three-fourths of students drop out before completing five years. English is taught in the secondary schools; as of 1982, however, English became the medium of instruction in the universities. Primary education lasts for five years followed by four years of secondary education at the first stage and two years at the second stage. Postsecondary institutions, including 18 teacher-training colleges, six agricultural institutes, eight technical institutes, and 35 universities and colleges, had a total enrollment of 245,317 students with 5,730 teaching staff in recent years.

Andrew Orphanage - Andrew Orphanage provides food for orphans, accommodation, education and protect them from social ills.

Burmese Students Association at IUPUI - Burmese Students Association at IUPUI is a group of nonprofit organization promoting and educating international communities about Burma.

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Volunteers In Asia - VIA is an international, private, non-profit, organization dedicated to increasing understanding between the United States and Asia. Since 1963, our volunteer programs have operated with the understanding that immersion into a community for an extended period of time leads to a deeper exchange and a chance for meaningful dialogue. We currently offer summer and long-term programs in China, Vietnam and Indonesia. Our long-term programs are open to college graduates of all ages who are US citizens or residents, while our summer programs are open to college undergraduates.