Japan and Special Economic Zones in Myanmar

The human cost of economic development is the subject of Chapter 4. The primary incentive of both the Japanese government and businesses in encouraging Myanmar’s democratization process was to exploit the human and natural resources of the country and construct economic corridors across the Mekong region to facilitate trade. The Japanese government’s support for Japanese business ventures in Myanmar was encapsulated in its sponsoring, through the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), of the Thilawa Special Economic Zone (SEZ). Though the Thilawa SEZ should have been developed in accordance with JICA’s Official Development Assistance (ODA) guidelines, the land of the Thilawa residents was coercively appropriated, the residents were inadequately compensated and moved to an inappropriate relocation site where the quality of housing was poor and the conditions for life were unsanitary. Japan’s support for the construction of the Dawei SEZ witnessed similar land grabs at the expense of the local population. The Thilawa and Dawei cases highlight a major discrepancy between Japanese policy makers’ rhetorical commitment to human security and the reality of neoliberal imperatives in Myanmar.