Australia eyes more trade with Myanmar
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Australia's Minister for Foreign Affairs Julie Bishop will visit to Myanmar this week to drum up business between the two countries.
"I will meet with Australian business representatives to discuss what the Australian and Myanmar governments can do to enhance trade and investment links," she said in a media release.
Bishop will meet President Thein Sein and other members of the government, as well as Aung San Suu Kyi, chairperson of the National League for Democracy, according to Australia’s Foreign Ministry.
"During the visit, I will reaffirm Australia’s support for the reform process and for the Myanmar government’s chairmanship of ASEAN this year," Bishop said in her statement.
Bishop, who is also the deputy leader of the Liberal Party, said she will also stress the importance of finding a peaceful resolution to ethnic and sectarian unrest, particularly in Rakhine State.
She also plans to visit the Laos, which will assume the lead of Asean in 2016.
Maung Aung, senior adviser to the Ministry of Commerce, is optimistic about the effect her visit will have on economic ties.
"I believe her visit will help improve Myanmar-Australia economic ties," he said. "Australia is one of the western countries that have lifted most of the sanctions imposed on us. But at the moment, it stands very far from the Top 10 list of our principal export destinations. So we need to encourage bilateral trade," Maung Aung said.
Agricultural products, textiles and garments will become major export products to Australia in the near future, he said. Last year, Australia’s major exports to Myanmar included wheat, base metals, and paints. Its main imports from Myanmar were fishery products and vegetables, according to Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.
Trade between the two countries grew 38.2 per cent last year to a total of about US$130 million.
Australia lifted its travel and financial sanctions against Myanmar in July 2012, but it continues to ban trade in arms. The country’s Autonomous Sanctions Regulations 2011 prohibits the supply, sale or transfer of arms and related materials and the provision of related services to Myanmar, including military and military-affiliated companies.
