YANGON: Myanmar has revised its forecast for foreign direct investment (FDI) to more than $5 billion for the fiscal year that began in April, a senior official said on Tuesday, surpassing earlier expectations and led by new ventures in energy and telecoms.

The figure exceeds an earlier estimate of $4bn, with investments in the first five months of this fiscal year worth $3.32bn, said Aung Naing Oo, secretary of the government-run Myanmar Investment Commission (MIC).

“Considering the rapid growth in the inflow of FDI in the first five months during this fiscal year, we’ve revised our estimates,” he told Reuters. “It will be over $5bn.”

The surge in investment follows a series of political and economic reforms launched three years ago.

The suspension of most sanctions by the European Union and the United States, in place since the 1990s over the poor human rights record of the former junta, has allowed more investment to flow into a country rich in energy and mining resources and strategically located between India, China and Southeast Asia.

Published in Dawn, September 17th, 2014