Sean Turnell, special economic consultant to Aung San Suu Kyi, said “No Action, Talk Only”, as there are no incoming investments from western countries, significantly would-be investment from the U.S. and Europe in the future.
While Myanmar government is trying to build infrastructures in many areas and focus on improving Myanmar economics substantially, there are a lot of challenges to face in many ways. Since August last year, many alleged reports of violence against the Bengali Muslims – that forced nearly a million illegal back into neighboring Bangladesh – was released. That effects on the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in negative ways and missed out on many opportunities. “The thing about western investment is not that it has stopped flowing, the truth is that it never came,” Turnell said then. According to the data supplied by Myanmar’s Directorate of Investment and Company Administration, FDI in Myanmar is over $30 million, including $2.6 billion from European Union Countries. The biggest FDI country is Singapore with $14.5 billion followed by China and Hong Kong, investing $7.1 billion from starting 2014-15 financial years. Singapore’s investment includes indirect investment from western countries.
However, there are still strong capitals inflows from Japan, China, South Korea and Singapore in spite of them fall short of expectation.
