President Urges Agro-Based Industrialization to Drive Economic Growth

Shifting from traditional farming to integrated, value-added agro-industries is key to boosting rural incomes, cutting food costs, and driving national productivity.

President of the Re­public of the Union of Myanmar U Min Aung Hlaing attended and delivered a comprehen­sive keynote address at the opening ceremony of the national-level workshop titled “From Agricultural Development to National Productivity Growth”, held at the Myanmar Interna­tional Convention Centre I (MICC I) in Nay Pyi Taw yesterday morning.

Before delivering his address, the President for­mally inaugurated the na­tional workshop by pressing a digital control switch.

In his keynote speech, the President highlighted that approximately 70 per cent of the country’s popu­lation resides in rural areas, with over 50 per cent of the national workforce engaged directly in agriculture, live­stock breeding, and forestry sectors. With around 30 per cent of the population cur­rently assessed to be living in poverty, improving rural household incomes remains an urgent national priori­ty. He stressed that tran­sitioning from traditional, subsistence farming to sys­tematic, modernized pro­duction methods that yield high-value agro-products is the most effective vehicle for raising family incomes and uplifting rural liveli­hoods.

Explaining the concep­tual foundation of the work­shop’s theme, the President noted that the objective is not confined to developing the primary agricultural sector in isolation. Rather, it represents a strategic policy blueprint designed to construct an unbroken value chain extending from agricultural harvests to raw inputs, intermediate pro­cessing, finished industri­al commodities, domestic distribution, and interna­tional export markets. He observed that contempo­rary global economic de­velopment cannot succeed through segregated sec­toral policies.

Sustainable prosperi­ty demands strong struc­tural links that connect agriculture, manufactur­ing, services, financial systems, technology, and market distribution net­works to multiply output value.

Consequently, the core question confronting the workshop is not merely how to expand crop vol­ume, but how to elevate product value and system­atically convert agricultur­al yields into high-yielding national productive assets. Agriculture serves as the cornerstone of Myanmar’s food security, socioeco­nomic stability, and broad­er national development. It supplies daily subsistence while feeding essential raw materials to industri­al enterprises. Address­ing this sector requires an integrated sequence: production, raw supplies, processing, value addition, industrial manufacturing, domestic consumption, and export. Strengthen­ing this entire value chain will expand farm incomes, generate employment, invigorate domestic in­dustry, enhance export earnings, and ultimately expand Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

Focusing on geopolit­ical and spatial dynamics, the President explained that Myanmar occupies an exceptionally strate­gic position within South- East Asia, situated directly between the world’s two most populous nations – India to the west with over 1.43 billion people and China to the east with over 1.41 billion peo­ple, alongside Bangladesh with roughly 173 million residents. Moreover, My­anmar sits squarely within the Valeriepieris Circle, a geographic zone encom­passing roughly half the global population. This presents an immense regional market for My­anmar’s agricultural and livestock exports. When coupled with rich arable land, diverse climatic zones, extended coast­lines, and abundant natu­ral resources, the country possesses extraordinary structural endowments.

However, the Presi­dent cautioned that geo­graphic and environmen­tal advantages do not translate automatically into economic wealth. These assets deliver tangible gains only when converted into higher pro­ductivity, superior quality standards, advanced pro­cessing technology, and international cost com­petitiveness.

Turning to domestic challenges, the President identified soaring prices of basic consumer foods as a pressing burden on public living standards. Price es­calation is primarily driv­en by supply and demand mismatches alongside high production, transport, and logistics overheads. To alleviate these pressures, the country must marked­ly scale up agricultural and livestock output, ensuring ample domestic supplies that bring retail food pric­es down to affordable lev­els.

Citing Vietnam as a benchmark, the Presi­dent noted that despite possessing only half of Myanmar’s landmass and having double its popula­tion – with two-thirds of its terrain covered by moun­tainous regions – Vietnam successfully exports over eight million tonnes of rice valued at more than US$4 billion, over one million tonnes of coffee worth US$8 billion, and more than 240,000 tonnes of pep­per valued at US$1 billion annually. By comparison, Myanmar earned US$4.741 billion from agricultural exports in the 2024-2025 fi­nancial year and US$3.743 billion in 2025-2026.

Analytical projec­tions demonstrate that if domestic farmers meet designated per-acre tar­get yields, national output could gain US$4 billion; in­creasing nationwide crop­ping intensity could deliver an additional US$12 bil­lion. Thus, moving from outdated methods to mod­ern, sustainable farming is the decisive first step toward national econom­ic expansion and poverty alleviation.

The President stressed that agricultur­al policy must balance commercial profit with long-term national food se­curity. With the global pop­ulation standing near eight billion and anticipated to reach 10 billion by 2050, international food demand will expand sharply amid regional conflicts, climate shifts, and supply-chain interruptions. Myanmar must secure domestic suf­ficiency while re-establish­ing itself as an essential regional and global food supplier – a true “rice gra­nary of the world”.

Regarding the rice sector, he called for com­prehensive improvements spanning milling, sorting, storage, branding, and ex­port logistics to realize the vision of a renewed golden age for Myanmar Pawsan rice. In competitive ex­port markets, domestic enterprises must adhere to clear commercial prin­ciples: offering superior quality at equal pricing, or lower pricing for matching quality, while prioritizing high-volume turnover over excessive profit margins.

Addressing the nation­al cooking oil shortfall, the President cited findings from a November 2021 study by the Food and Fer­tilizer Technology Centre for the Asian and Pacific Region (FFTC-AP) cover­ing 220 households in Nay Pyi Taw. The survey re­vealed that families spent 63 per cent of monthly income on food, with rice (17.75 per cent) and cook­ing oil (13.16 per cent) rep­resenting the two largest household expenses. Be­cause domestic sesame, groundnut, and sunflower oils remain costlier than consumer purchasing pow­er allows, working-class households rely heavily on imported palm oil. Con­sequently, the State must spend substantial foreign currency importing be­tween 550,000 and 650,000 tonnes of palm oil annual­ly, even though theoreti­cal national production of oilseed crops exceeds one million tonnes. To correct this imbalance, the Pres­ident called for lower do­mestic production costs, systematic yield expan­sion, progressive reduc­tions in palm oil imports, and the commercial adop­tion of modern rice bran oil extraction technologies using milling by-products.

In his supplementary remarks, the President reviewed the 2025-2026 fi­nancial year data, noting that paddy was sown and harvested on 17.4 million acres, producing an av­erage yield of roughly 85 baskets per acre. Achiev­ing established target yields would generate an extra US$3 billion in val­ue, while double-cropping could yield US$15 billion. Expanding target yields across the State’s nine pri­ority crops would further capture US$6.5 billion in lost export revenues.

Furthermore, with 30 per cent of the national population – around 15 million citizens – residing in urban centres, meet­ing basic daily nutritional needs requires substan­tial livestock expansion. A consumption rate of one egg per urban resident daily requires a nation­al flock of 20 million lay­ing hens, while meeting modest daily poultry and pork consumption targets demands 800,000 broiler chickens and nearly 16,000 pigs every day.

To develop rural economies, the President advocated for the “One Region- One Product” (OROP) initiative, along­side zero-waste agro-pro­cessing across sectors such as cotton, bamboo, and sugarcane. Cotton should be processed local­ly into yarn and apparel rather than exported as raw fibre; bamboo should be manufactured into con­sumer items, charcoal, and furniture; and sugarcane waste and molasses should be transformed into organ­ic fertilizers and distillates. Integrating apiculture with sunflower and sesame farming would likewise boost pollination and gen­erate extra farm income.

To finance modern ag­ricultural transformation, the President urged com­mercial banks to design tailored credit instruments matched to agricultural production and revenue cycles. Emphasizing ef­fective implementation, he concluded by urging delegates from both the public and private sectors to formulate actionable, time-bound strategies through Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) rather than remaining confined to theoretical papers.

Following the opening session, Union Minister for Finance and Revenue Dr Kan Zaw presented a commemorative gift to the President. The Presi­dent and attendees subse­quently viewed commem­orative exhibition booths displaying agricultural in­novations and production models, during which the President provided neces­sary operational guidance.

The opening cere­mony was attended by Vice-Presidents U Nyo Saw and Nan Ni Ni Aye, Pyithu Hluttaw Speaker U Khin Yi, Amyotha Hlut­taw Speaker U Aung Lin Dwe, Commander-in-Chief of Defence Services Gen­eral Ye Win Oo, Union Ministers and Union-lev­el dignitaries, the chair­man of the Nay Pyi Taw Council, chief ministers of Regions and States, senior military officers from the Office of the Command­er-in-Chief, chairpersons and secretaries of Hluttaw standing committees, the Commander of Nay Pyi Taw Command, deputy ministers, heads of depart­ments, the President and executives of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar Federation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry (UMFCCI), subject-matter experts and scholars, and invitees. — MNA/ST