Myanmar Telecommunications 

4.11 Myanmar Additional Services Contact List

Myanmar lags far behind the rest of Southeast Asia, with the lowest Internet, mobile, and telephone usage rates. The Information and Communication Technology infrastructure is weak. The 2012 World Development Indicators showed that only 1% of the population had access to fixed lines. Mobile subscription rates at 11%, although rising, are low by regional comparison. Internet access is only at 1% of the population.

Until 2013 telecommunications used to be a monopoly of the government enterprise Myanma Post and Telecommunication (MPT). Since 2013 two private mobile phone companies entered the market, Ooredoo and Telenor. They provide mobile phone service through their own network, which does not yet offer countrywide coverage. The internet backbone is being managed by MPT and there are a few companies that provide internet services by reselling bandwidth of MPT.

Mobile sim-cards, 3G with data, can be bought easily, but it is difficult to get a landline. MPT has difficulties extending the infrastructure for the landline network. Mobile sim card cost approximately 1500 MMK while a new landline connection costs over 500,000 MMK.

Telecommunication Regulation

Organisations must apply for a Telecommunications Equipment licence and for allocation of radio frequencies with the Post and Telecommunications Department, under the Ministry of Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT), in accordance with the Telecommunications law, 8 Oct 2013. Equipment requiring a telecommunications license are: UHF, HF and VHF radio’s, UHF/VHF repeaters, VSAT and satellite telephone and RBGAN equipment.

Source: (Publisher) MCIT , Date accessed: 4 Dec 2014.

No solid, standard procedure exists at the moment to apply for telecommunications equipment licenses. The UN has applied through the Foreign Economic Relations Department (FERD) and the Ministry of Border Affairs (Natala) to the Ministry of Communications for licenses for their radio equipment. A government board of the Ministry of Communications makes the decisions on a case-by-case basis and the duration of the process is unpredictable. The UN applied for a countrywide radio license for the UN as a whole, in 2011-‘12 and to-date (e.o. 2014) the application has not yet been approved. UNDSS has tried to start separately a parallel application process since 2013, but also they have had no success yet.

Existing Humanitarian Telecoms Systems

UN agencies in Myanmar use VHF, HF, HF-Repeaters and VSAT. Some Agencies share their connections with sister agencies. UNDP share their VSAT connection with UNFPA, UNDSS, UNHABITAT and UNESCO. All agencies share UNDSS HF-radio repeaters in Yangon. In project operations area’s UNDSS and WFP have setup repeaters for the UN shared frequencies, which can be used by other UN agencies. These repeaters are managed by UNDSS and WFP.

INGOs in Myanmar do not use the UN frequencies and generally they don’t use HF and VHF radios.

4.11 Myanmar Additional Services Contact List