Overview

Lwe Jel is the town located in Momauk Township, Bhamo District, North West of Myanmar in Kachin State. It is bordered by Longchuan County, Yunnan Province, China, one of the 10 trade gates with four neighboring countries opened in 2002.

The nearest large town or city in China is Kyan Phone, Longchuan County District, with a population of 170,000, which is smaller as Myitkyina. China accounts for 95 percent of Myanmar’s fruit exports. There is no large potential for cross-border trade at Lwe Jel without making significant improvements of border transshipment procedures on both sides.

Lwe Jel Town (Momauk Township, Bhamo District, Kachin State, Myanmar)

Border Gate, Lwe Jel

Border Gate, Lwe Jel

Border Gate, Lwe Jel

Customs Clearance

Average 70 vehicles per day are processed by customs. Cross border traffic limited to local trade in agricultural products (exported to China), such as beans, rice, onions and fruits and textiles, foodstuffs, and electronics (imported into Myanmar). Private cars cannot freely move between the borders. Cargo trucks can pass the China border up to Liayoon, the vehicles usually do loading/off-loading in Liayoon Village by manual labour, hand carried or by using pushcarts and motorcycles for a distance of about 1km to pass the Myanmar - China border checkpoint.

Customs clearance time will be depending on the type of commodities, provided the documents are completed and in order. There are no customs clearance fees except the cost of forms: Import declaration form 50 Kyat, export declaration form 40 Kyat. Gross weight of the cargo will be checked. There is no weight bridge, but a scale is used to weigh cargo units.

All imports and exports can be completed in Lwe Jel, it offers a one-stop service for food, medicines, and agricultural products. Commercial invoices and letter of credits, license, recommendation letter for Humanitarian Aids from Kachin State Government or respective line ministry will be required. For local agricultural products, there used to be a barter trade system and invoices were not available for local products and detailed packing list is also not required.

Minimum requirements in terms of documentations are:

1. Import License or export license (from dept. of Trade). See Note 1 below.
2. Import declaration form (Cusdec 1) or export declaration form (Cusdec 2)
3. Commercial invoice or bill of sale.
4. For Humanitarian Agencies: Recommendation Letter from Kachin State Government or respective line ministry, Tax exemption certificate., etc.

Note 1: Depending on the type goods as classified according to the harmonized customs HS-code: licensed / un-licensed goods. Un-licensed goods do not require an import & export license, instead they only require the import and export declaration form and commercial invoice or bill of sale.

Restricted items are precursors (raw materials) for medicines, unregistered medicines, arms & ammunitions, vehicles, radio equipment, illegal drugs, fragrant woods.

For more information on customs in Myanmar, please see the following link: 1.3 Customs Information.  

Other Relevant Information

Since informal trades still dominate the nature of transactions at the border crossing, trades volume remains relatively low although it gradually increases over time. Another factor to be considered is the security risk in the area that may disrupt trading activities.