Some economists argue, however, that Myanmar's prosperity and unity may depend upon claiming more revenue from raw materials.
Since a reformist government took office in March 2011, Myanmar has pinned its economic hopes on the resumption of foreign aid and investment. Myint Aung, Myanmar's Minister of Mines, did not reply to written questions from Reuters about the jade industry's missing millions and social costs.
In a rare visit to the heart of Myanmar's secretive jade-mining industry in Hpakant, Reuters found an anarchic region where soldiers and ethnic rebels clash, and where mainland Chinese traders rub shoulders with heroin-fueled "handpickers" who are routinely buried alive while scavenging for stones. Such squandered wealth symbolizes a wider challenge in Myanmar, an impoverished country whose natural resources - including oil, timber and precious metals - have long fueled armed conflicts while enriching only powerful individuals or groups. But jade is included in official imports of precious stones and metals, which in 2012 were worth $293 million - a figure still too small to explain where billions of dollars of Myanmar jade has gone. China doesn't publicly report how much jade it imports from Myanmar. Official Chinese statistics only deepen the mystery. But official exports of jade that year stood at only $34 million.
Even valued at a conservative $100 per kg, it was worth $4.3 billion. Myanmar produced more than 43 million kg of jade in fiscal year 2011/12 (April to March).
Official statistics confirm these missing billions. This represents billions of dollars in lost revenues that could be spent on rebuilding a nation shattered by nearly half a century of military dictatorship. That's about $50,000 - and it was more than enough money for Tin Tun, 38, to buy land and build a house in his home village.īut rare finds by small-time prospectors like Tin Tun pale next to the staggering wealth extracted on an industrial scale by Myanmar's military, the tycoons it helped enrich, and companies linked to the country where most jade ends up: China.Īlmost half of all jade sales are "unofficial" - that is, spirited over the border into China with little or no formal taxation. "Last year I found a stone worth 50 million kyat," he said, trekking past the craters and slag heaps of this notorious jade-mining region in northwest Myanmar.
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