ABOUT MYANMAR

Health

Myanmar offers a high level of health and welfare services. The number of hospital beds is about 30000 for about 10 per 10000 of population. Rural health centers have grown and there are 15000 doctors, 11000 nurses and 9500 midwives. Even though it is in the area of Malaria, it doesn’t contain the whole country. Only some parts, which are very forestry or mountainous zone, for example, the extremely northern part, the jungle area, etc. It accepts considerable international aid in combating the extensive AIDS epidemic. The international community offers limited assistance in drug control programs.

Economy

Myanmar is primarily an agriculture country. About two-third of the working population is engaged in growing or processing crops, while about one-tenth works in industry. Before World War II Myanmar was the world’s major rice exporter. After the war, the area of land devoted to agriculture slowly recovered, but as the population grew the surplus available for export never reached the earlier level. For a while forestry was the major export earner. Today, tourism, though small by international standard, is the major source of foreign exchange. From 1962 to 1988 the country was closed to the world and in the 1990s, the military government took over the power and has opened the economy to market forces, particularly inviting foreign investment.

Education

Education is free and compulsory for primary and middle schools, but fees are charged for high school. Secondary education consists of four years of middle or vocational school and an additional two years for high school. About one-fifth of the secondary school-age population is enrolled in school. About 85% of the population is truly literate.
There are also many universities and colleagues, mainly in the big cities.

Safety

Myanmar is a very friendly and safe country. You can go around the cities, towns and villages without any worry even in the night time. But basically, there is nothing on the road apart from 22:00 in the big cities and in the small towns or villages everybody goes to bed at about 20:00 or 21:00.
Myanmar can be said ONE OF THE SAFETIEST COUNTRIES in the world.

Transportation

The railroad system has been owned and operated by the government since British times; it includes about 4000 km of track, but it doesn’t connect with railroads outside of Myanmar. Far more important for moving domestic passengers and cargo are the inland waterways, which total about 12800 km of navigable rivers and canals, about 3200 km of which are open to large commercial vessels. Most of Myanmar’s largest towns and cities are river ports.
Highways total about 27000 km, of which about 12% are paved, 65% are gravel, and the rest passable most easily by jeep or ox cart. In the 1990s, the government has focused considerable energy o reconstructing roads, often with volunteer or forced labor. Altogether, however, the amount of new road added since 1990 has averaged less than 200 km per year, compared to an average of 970 km per year in previous years. There are extensive road links and several bridge links with Thailand and China.
There are four domestic airlines, Myanmar Airways (government-owned), Yangon Airways, Air Mandalay and Air Bagan, which are private airlines.

Myanmar Airways is used only for the off beaten places, where private airlines do not go due to its poor services, less punctuality and not so reliable. Yangon Airways, Air Mandalay and Air Bagan operate with modern aircraft ATR 72/42 and F-100 with good services, reliable and punctual.
The taxis can be found easily only in Yangon. All the local buses are over crowded and it is not easy to ask the information at the bus stops.
In other places, we can find easily the trishaws, the horse carts, the bicycles, etc.

Communication

All postal, telegraph, telephone and broadcasting systems in Myanmar are controlled by the government. There are three government TV channels. In some of the big cities, such as Yangon, Mandalay, etc., satellite dishes are used.
The postal service is quite slow but it doesn’t cost a lot. A postcard from Yangon to abroad can take more or less three weeks but it costs only 50 kyats. If we mail from outside of Yangon, it can take more.
Telephone system is now easier than before, but it quite expensive.
The mobiles outside of Myanmar don’t have the network in Myanmar. The country does have its own networks for using internally (mainly in most of the cities).
The internets are available in Yangon, Mandalay and Bagan but yahoo & hotmail accesses are banned. We can open our new account with other accesses to receive or send the messages. In Yangon & Mandalay, we can find some services, where we can have access to internets and e-mails.
IDD country code of Myanmar is 95. The area code of Yangon is 1, of Mxandalay & Bagan are 2 and, of Inle Lake is 81.
 

CURRENCY

Myanmar currency is the Kyat, made up of 100 pyar Currency notes come in the following denomination : K 1000, K 500, K 200, K 100, K 50, K 20, K 10, K 5, K 1. Visitors are not allowed to bring in or take out it.
 

Weights

The most common units of weight used in Myanmar are viss, pounds and ticals. One viss equals 3.6 pounds (1.6 kg) or 100 ticals. One tical equals 16 gm.
 

Volume

At the retail level, rice and small fruits or nuts are sold in units of volume rather than weight; the most common measure is the standard condensed milk can. Eight cans equal one small rice basket or pyi and 16 pyi make a jute sack or tinn.Petrol and most other liquids are sold by the imperial gallons (4.55 liters). One exception is milk, which is sold by the viss.
 

Length & Distance

Cloths and other items of moderate length are measured by the yard (91.5 cm). Road distances are measured in miles (one mile=1.6 km). Shorter distances in town or in the countryside may be quoted in furlongs. There are eight furlongs in one mile; thus one furlong equals about two-tenths of a km.

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