Kyaukpyu

Kyaukpyu
ကျောက်ဖြူမြို့
Kyaukpyu

Location in Burma

Coordinates: 19°26′0″N 93°33′0″E / 19.43333°N 93.55000°E / 19.43333; 93.55000
Country  Myanmar
Division Rakhine State
District Kyaukpyu District
Township Kyaukpyu Township
Population (2014)
 • Total 44,500
 • Ethnicities Arakanese
 • Religions Buddhism
Time zone MST (UTC+6.30)
Area code(s) +95-43-46-xxx
[1]

Kyaukpyu (Burmese: ကျောက်ဖြူမြို့ [tɕaʊʔpʰjú mjo̰]; also spelled Kyaukphyu) is a major town in Rakhine State, in western Myanmar. It is located on the north western corner of Yanbye Island on Combermere Bay, and is 250 miles (400 km) north-west of Yangon. It is the principal town of Kyaukpyu Township and Kyaukpyu District. The town is situated on a superb natural harbor which connects the rice trade between Calcutta and Yangon. The estimated population in 1983 was 19,456 inhabitants.[2] In 2014, Kyaukphyu population increased 44,500 inhabitants.[3]

Etymology

The name Kyaukpyu (lit. "white rock") is the Burmese pronunciation. In the local Rangbre pronunciation of the natives of Kyaukpyu and in standard Arakanese, the town's name is pronounced "Kyaukpru". The old Kyaukpyu is situated 7 miles from the present town where two colossal white rocks exist.

History

The place where the present town was originally a small fishing village in the 17th Century. After the first Anglo-Burmese War, the British established Kyaukpyu in 1837 on the spot of the fishing village. In 1852, Kyaukphyu became a district city.[4]

On October 22, 2010, Cyclone Giri made landfall on the west coast of Myanmar just north of the town at category five strength.

Climate

Kyaukpyu has a tropical monsoon climate (Köppen climate classification Am). Temperatures are very warm throughout the year, although the winter months (December–February) are somewhat milder. There is a winter dry season (December–April) and a summer wet season (May–November). Torrential rain falls from June to August, with over 1,200 millimetres (47 in) falling in July alone.

Climate data for Kyaukpyu
Month Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Year
Average high °C (°F) 26.3
(79.3)		 27.4
(81.3)		 29.4
(84.9)		 31.8
(89.2)		 32.4
(90.3)		 29.4
(84.9)		 28.7
(83.7)		 28.7
(83.7)		 29.9
(85.8)		 30.5
(86.9)		 29.3
(84.7)		 27.2
(81)		 29.25
(84.64)
Average low °C (°F) 17.4
(63.3)		 18.1
(64.6)		 21.1
(70)		 24.2
(75.6)		 25.5
(77.9)		 24.4
(75.9)		 24.1
(75.4)		 24.3
(75.7)		 23.0
(73.4)		 24.4
(75.9)		 22.8
(73)		 19.2
(66.6)		 22.38
(72.27)
Average precipitation mm (inches) 5
(0.2)		 8
(0.31)		 3
(0.12)		 32
(1.26)		 253
(9.96)		 1,012
(39.84)		 1,232
(48.5)		 989
(38.94)		 575
(22.64)		 270
(10.63)		 89
(3.5)		 13
(0.51)		 4,481
(176.41)
Source: NOAA (1961–1990) [5]

Demographics

The town is populated with Arakanese Buddhists. There are also small Indian group, Kameins and Chins at Kyaukphru.

Quarters or Wards

Attractions

Education

Teacher training college (TTC) was opened in Kyaukpyu in 1953. Now, this college is known as "Kyaukpyu Education College". In 1954, Kyaukpyu Intermediate College for Arakan, the embryo of Sittwe University was opened in Kyaukpyu. Kyaukpyu GTI was opened in 2014.

Other

Maurice Collis, a famous British writer, lived in Kyaukpyu in 1920s. His house, situated outskirts of Kyaukpyu is maintained as a historic building.

Water ways is the main mode of transportation and traveling. There were boat accidents because of poor maintenance and lack of enforcement on regulation. Over 100 were assumed to be dead in Aung Takon 3 ferry accident of March 2015.[6]

Economy

In June 2007, Asia World announced that it would be building a deep sea port on Maday Island in Kyaukphyu, Rakhine State.[7] The port will be a transit point for goods destined for Yangon, Kolkata, and Chittagong.[8] In December 2008, China and Burma signed a deal to construct an oil pipeline at Kyaukphyu.[9] On 30 November 2010, the China Development Bank and Myanmar Foreign Investment Bank signed a $2.4 billion loan deal to construct the 660 miles (1,060 km) pipeline from Kyaukphyu to Kunming in Yunnan province, China.[10] The pipeline is expected to be completed in 2015 and capable of transporting 400,000 barrels of oil per day.[9] These construction projects will allow China to directly obtain oil and gas from the Middle East (via the port terminal at Kyaukphyu), thereby avoiding shipping through the Malacca Straits.[11]

Separately, as reported by the Financial Times in February 2013,[12] nearly 2,000 workers are finalising close to Kyaukphyu, a major natural gas projects, the Shwe gas pipeline and onshore terminal. This terminal and pipeline are being built by South Korea’s Daewoo International in a consortium with state-owned Myanmar Oil and Gas Enterprise (MOGE) and others. From May 2013, this pipeline is planned to pump about 12bn cubic metres of natural gas annually, most of which will also go to China via nearby Maday island.

These oil and gas Sino-Burma pipelines projects are supervised by a Myanmar "Kyaukpyu Special Economic Zone" agency and are estimated to use about U$3bn of investments and to have the potential of creating over 200,000 jobs, while additional capital will be required to develop a port for dry containerized and bulk cargoes, as well as a railway which will link Kyaukphyu to Kunming, in Yunnan. This railway project would be 1,215 km long, and its design and construction are subject to a preliminary agreement between Myanmar's and China's government.

Myanmar government officials have stated that these massive projects will be conducted with enhanced consultation with the local population. In this respect, there has already been protests by some locals against the consequences of some of these projects, such as potential impact on fishing or land confiscations which may be conducted by authorities for these terminals and pipelines. A December 2012 report by the "Arakan Oil Watch" organization about plans to build a special economic zone near Kyaukphyu on Ramree Island in Arakan State, claimed it would "endanger the health of thousands of people and destroy Myanmar’s second largest mangrove forest". The report, titled “Danger Zone,” states that around 40 villages would be adversely affected by the project, which would use 120 km2 of pristine coastline.

End December 2015, the Myanmar government announced that it had chosen a consortium of mostly Chinese companies to develop a special economic zone and a port, as a result of a tender initiated in 2014 for an industrial park and a deep-water port to be built and operated as public-private partnerships.

The selected Chinese-led consortium won over a dozen other bidders to win the development rights late last year. The six companies in the consortium include China state-owned groups Citic (finance), China Harbour Engineering, China Merchants Holdings (International), TEDA Investment Holding, Yunnan Construction Engineering Group (YNJG), and the Charoen Pokphand Group, a Thai conglomerate. CITIC and the six other investing firms will hold an 85 percent stake, with the Burmese government taking the rest.

While China Harbour Engineering is a well known engineering firm for designing and building deep sea ports, the China Merchants Group, through some of its affiliates (China Merchants Holdings (International), China Merchants Group, both listed on the Hong Kong stock exchange, and China Merchants Energy Shipping) is a global operator of ports as well as of oil tanker and dry bulk ships which has been approved to absorb in 2016 another Chinese state-controlled tanker and bulk ships operator, Sinotrans Shipping.

By 2025, the consortium plans to build a roughly 1,000-hectare industrial park and Myanmar's highest-capacity port, with facilities able to handle 7 million 20-foot-equivalent-units (TEU) of containerized cargo per year. Total project costs are estimated to be in the range of several billion dollars. The projects are said to lead to the creation of some 100,000 jobs.

Some analysts claim that the Kyaukpyu port may be part of a String of Pearls strategy by China, while others dismiss this.[13]

The Kyaukpyu port and Special Economic Zone (SEZ) is one of three major port and coastal development projects in Myanmar, together with the Thilawa zone near Yangon, the country's most populous and economically developed city, and the Dawei zone in the south-east, near the Thai border, all of which have attracted major financial and industrial interests.

References

  1. ↑ "National Telephone Area Codes". Myanmar Yellow Pages.
  2. ↑ "Kyaukpyu". Retrieved 2010-06-27.
  3. ↑ "3K_Rakhine_Figures_ENG.pdf". Google Docs. Retrieved 2015-10-09.
  4. ↑ Kyaukpyu township Gazeteers.
  5. ↑ "Kayukpyu Climate Normals 1961-1990". National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Retrieved January 12, 2013.
  6. ↑ Mratt Kyaw Thu. "Ferry death toll increases as parliament demands inquiry". http://www.mmtimes.com/. Myanmartimes. Retrieved 24 March 2015. External link in |website= (help)
  7. ↑ "B'desh eyes deep-sea port near Myanmar". Myanmar Times. 30 July 2007. Retrieved 5 March 2012.
  8. ↑ Ye Lwin (16 July 2007). "Exports to get lift from new shipping companies". Myanmar Times. Retrieved 5 March 2012.
  9. 1 2 Kean, Thomas (30 November 2009). "Kyaukphyu-Yunnan oil pipeline to be completed by end of 2015". Myanmar Times. Retrieved 5 March 2012.
  10. ↑ Shwe Gaung, Juliet (13 December 2010). "Massive loan from China to fund gas investment". Myanmar Times. Retrieved 5 March 2012.
  11. ↑ "Kyaukphyu port has strategic value". Myanmar Times. 21 December 2009. Retrieved 5 March 2012.
  12. ↑ "Myanmar plans its own ‘mini Singapore’ - FT.com". ft.com. Retrieved 2014-04-18.
  13. ↑ David Brewster. "Beyond the String of Pearls: Is there really a Security Dilemma in the Indian Ocean?. Retrieved 30 August 2014".

Coordinates: (181000) 19°26′0″N 93°33′0″E / 19.43333°N 93.55000°E / 19.43333; 93.55000

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