VietNamNet Bridge – The East West Economic Corridor (EWEC) has been compared as the Silk Road in South East Asia. Da Nang, the city at the end of the corridor, has every reason to expect the golden opportunity to develop its economy.

The EWEC has the total length of 1450 kilometers, running across 13 provinces of four countries including Myanmar, Thailand, Laos and Vietnam.

Since its establishment 14 years ago, with the great efforts made by the governments and the donors, the transport infrastructure of EWEC has been upgraded significantly.

In Vietnam, the EWEC begins at the Lao Bao international border gate and ends at the Tien Sa port in Da Nang City. Three big projects have been implemented on the route, including the one on upgrading the Highway No. 9, the interministerial check-point stations at the Lao Bao (Vietnam) – Dansavanh (Laos). The project, which had the total investment capital of 25 million dollars with the loans from ADB, completed in 2006.

The project on upgrading Tien Sa Port with the capacity of 4 million tons per annum, and the Tuyen Son bridge for container vehicles crossing over the Han River was put into traffic in February 2004.

In Myanmar, with the support from Thailand, the road from the Mawlamvie port, the starting point of EWEC to the Myanmar – Thailand border has been upgraded.

In Laos, Savanakhet airport has been upgraded to operate as an international airport. Especially, the bridge connecting Mukdahan in Thailand with Dansavanh in Laos, crossing over the Mekong River, was completed in 2006, thus putting the whole EWEC route through.

The Tien Sa port in Da Nang City, the last point of the corridor is expected to operate as the jumping off place for Da Nang economy to take off.

To date, some 2000 commercial vehicles bearing different nationalities have been licensed to use EWEC.

All the EWEC-area countries, except Myanmar, wish to see the “three countries, one destination” program to turn realistic. However, only Thailand has got modern infrastructure system and road network.

The infrastructure systems in Vietnam and Laos have been upgraded gradually. However, it takes more time to travel with the systems because of a lot of barriers. It takes 4-5 hours, for example, to travel from Da Nang to Lao Bao which has the distance of 260 kilometers. It would also take 2-3 hours more to show documents at check-point stations and one hour more to follow procedures at the Lao Bao - Dasavanh border gate.

Therefore, economists have suggested that the barriers need to be removed in order to take full advantage of the backbone economic corridor.

The great opportunity for Da Nang

Being the gateway to the sea, the three provinces of the central region in Vietnam (Quang Tri, Thua Thien-Hue, Da Nang), together with Quang Nam and Quang Ngai can serve as both the input and outlet for Thai, Myanmar, Lao, Chinese and Cambodian goods to go in or out.

Economists believe that Da Nang would be the motive force and the economic center in the region, the major transit point for goods, serving the import-export activities of the central region, a part of Laos, the north east of Thailand, Myanmar, or even reaching out to Yun Nan province in China.

According to ERIA, an economic forum for ASEAN and East Asian countries, if the customs procedures are simple and favorable, the impacts of the EWEC on Da Nang’s economy would increase by one more percent by 2015.

Vu Trung