5. Public Private Partnership

After decades of underdevelopment of public infrastructure and services, the Government of Myanmar has moved quickly to promote national development by embracing public-private partnerships (PPPs) in key areas of infrastructure investment where the private sector has expressed interest 1; the Government has initiated various forms of PPPs in the sectors of telecommunications, electricity, natural resources, housing, civil aviation, roads, and public transportation.

The power sector in particular has been a focus of the application of this strategy. By 2014, the Ministry of Electricity and Energy (MOEE) had signed more than 60 MoUs with private investors to prepare, finance, construct, and operate power generation projects.

The approach to project selection and negotiations has been relatively ad hoc, making it difficult for the government to determine whether value for money is being achieved, and it is in this context that in 2015 the government requested the assistance of the Asian Development Bank in developing a framework for Public-Private Partnerships.

Public Private Partnership is regulated by the Foreign Investment Law (2012), Myanmar Citizens Investment Law (2013), Myanmar Investment Law (2016), Presidential Directive 1/2017 – For Bidding Procedures.

In 2018, the Ministry of Planning, Finance and Industry (“ MoPFI ”) established the Project Bank through Notification 2/2018. Traditionally, each government department or agency would participate in PPP projects without the oversight of a centralized body. However, under the Notification, MoPFI has established a specialized unit, the PPP Centre, which is responsible for the criteria assessment of all PPP projects to be implemented by the relevant government departments or agencies as the Implementing Government Agency (“IGA”).

The main purpose of the Project Bank is to monitor priority PPP projects with total values exceeding 2 billion Kyat (approximately 1.3 million USD). It should be noted that PPP projects exceeding 100 million USD require the approval of the Cabinet.

In 2020, the PPP Centre published Notification No. 1/2020 for unsolicited proposals ( Unsolicited Proposals Notification). A Spontaneous Proposal is a proposal submitted by a private individual to undertake a PPP Project. If the scope of a project exceeds MMK 2 billion, the relevant government agency is required to seek advice from the PPP Centre on whether to include it in the Project Bank . For each spontaneous proposal that the relevant government agency decides to pursue, that agency, with the support provided by the PPP Centre, will prepare a “ Swiss Challenge” 2tender procedure .

Bank website ( https://projectbank.gov.mm/ ) is available but inaccessible with a system error message. The OpenDevelopment Myanmar portal lists 422 projects as of January 2021 3.