The jade industry at Hpakant in Kachin State is a multi-billion-dollar business in which risk flows downhill, from the company bosses to the mid-level traders and, at the bottom, the itinerant miners known as yemase who risk their lives each day in the hope of striking it rich.
Long-delayed plans to build a railway from Muse to Kyaukphyu have picked up steam since the beginning of the year under pressure from China, but many observers question whether Myanmar will benefit from the project.
BY Frontier
