Assessment and recommendations

The transformation of Myanmar from decades of isolation mirrors, on a smaller scale, the dramatic changes in Eastern and Central Europe in the 1990s, as well as the opening of both China and Viet Nam. The challenges for Myanmar in simultaneously engineering a political and economic transition are enormous. Reformers in the Myanmar government have laid out their ideas in the Framework for Economic and Social Reform, including budgetary and tax reforms monetary and financial sector reforms liberalisation of trade and investment food security and agricultural growth land issues and improvements in infrastructure availability and quality.