YANGON, 4 February 2016: A framework agreement to facilitate Official Development Aid (ODA) loans for the construction of Hanthawaddy Airport Development was signed late last week.
Official media, Global New Light of Myanmar, quoted Transport and Rail Transportation Minister, U Nyan Tun Aung, saying that following a series of meetings between Department of Civil Aviation and JGC-Yongnam-Changi Airport International Consortium, both sides reached a framework agreement for the ODA loans.
Japan’s JGC Corporation, Singapore’s Changi Airport International and Yongnam Holdings are part of the group that will build the new gateway airport.
The project will require an estimated investment of USD1.5 billion. The framework agreement stated that about 49% of the cost would be met from a ODA loan, a government-to-government loan from Japan with 0.01% interest rate.
Hanthawady International Airport project should open in 2022, four years after the target opening date. Delays were blamed on loan processing.
Hanthawaddy International Airport will be the largest commercial airport in the country.
Located in the Bago region, about 48 miles northeast of Yangon, roughly a 90-minute drive from Yangon, the international airport will have an initial capacity to handle 12 million passengers a year. The 9,000 acre site was a Japanese army airport during World War II.
Once finished, it will take over from Yangon International Airport as the country’s major international entry point.
Blueprints for the airport were first introduced in 1990s, but it was not until 2013 that the project moved forward. In 2014, a consortium including Singapore’s Yongnam Holdings, Changi Airport Planners and Engineers, and Japan’s JGC Corporation won the contract to build and operate the airport.
Myanmar’s Ministry of Hotels and Tourism estimates the country attracted 4.68 million international tourists in 2015, a 51.95% increase from 3.08 million in 2014.
According to the ministry’s Master Plan for 2013 to 2020, arrivals are projected to hit 7.49 million in 2020.
Source: TTR Weekly
