Building modern financial institutions and ensuring reliable intermediary functions for financial transactions, as well as better monetary policy to maintain order in the credit market, is crucial to Myanmar's successful longterm development. The purpose of this project was to facilitate policy research on these tasks. The topics covered included the mobilization of domestic capital, the gap between investment and savings, issues related to the increase in more sophisticated financial activities, and the creation of a financial system promoting domestic investment.
In fiscal 1998, the first year of the project, policy research on each of these four topics was conducted, and an international workshop was held to allow participants from Myanmar to exchange views and share experiences with academics and researchers from other countries in Southeast Asia and Japan.
This year, the project undertook a number of programs, building on the results of the previous year's research. In April 1999, the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS), the grant recipient, drew up proposals with the cooperation of a Myanmar working group for the mobilization of that country's domestic financial resources. In addition, ISEAS published the results of the project's research, including the policy proposals, under the title Financial Resources Development in Myanmar. On the basis of these results, and with the cooperation of a number of people in Japan and Southeast Asia, a seminar was held in Yangon December 17-18 for about 150 midlevel policy makers, business leaders, students, and researchers. The project's research findings were presented, and suggestions were made regarding the creation of systems for monetary policy and finance to achieve the mobilization of domestic financial resources that is essential to strengthening and modernizing the market economy in Myanmar.
Through the activities carried out over the two-year period, this project successfully and systematically r eviewed the issues of domestic savings and the mobilization of financial resources that confront Myanmar. As well as encouraging the Myanmar government to build modern financial institutions, it clarified the policy framework and the systems required to ensure reliable intermediary functions for financial transactions and to facilitate improved monetary policy to preserve order in the credit market. The project provided a blueprint for reform of Myanmar's financial system, served as a catalyst for the strengthening of personal networks among academics, researchers, policy makers, and business leaders in Myanmar, the rest of Southeast Asia, and Japan, and confirmed the effectiveness of development cooperation with third countries.