News


News of a cable car planned for Mon State’s famed Mount Kyaiktiyo next year has been greeted with a mixed reaction. MCRB has reported on poor waste disposal and waste management in Kyaiktiyo, which poses a serious threat to the environment.

Myanmar Centre for Responsible Business convened a meeting on 19 February at Chatrium Hotel Yangon to bring together a number of company, civil society, government and international NGO organisations and individuals who are involved in the Thilawa Special

MCRB held a “Multi-Stakeholder Workshop on Community Engagement in the Extractive Industries” in Yangon on 27/28 January 2015 to discuss international best practice in strategic community investment and engagement, including how to handle grievances.

MCRB held a “Multi-Stakeholder Workshop on Community Engagement in the Extractives Industries” in Yangon on 27/28 January 2015 to discuss international best practice in strategic community investment and engagement, including how to handle grievances.

Myanmar is among the fastest-growing telecommunications markets in the world. However, a key part of Myanmar’s telecommunications legal framework has yet to be finalised: rules governing the interception of communications by law enforcement.

MCRB today conducted a half-day multistakeholder workshop on environmental and social impact assessments (ESIAs) in Myanmar’s oil & gas sector for approximately 70 participants from Myanmar civil society organisations.

On 11-12 December 2014, Myanmar Centre for Responsible Business (MCRB) hosted a training session in Yangon on “Land Rights Documentation” in response to a request from various farmers’ networks.

Vicky Bowman, MCRB Director chaired a panel discussion on ‘Building Corporate Capacities for Responsible Investment and Responsible Business Practices in Myanmar’ at Yangon Institute of Economics on 9 December.

Salill Tripathi spoke in Yangon on ‘Digital Dangers’, the risks ICT companies face when, intended or not, they act in ways that lead to human rights abuses, sometimes due to their actions, sometimes complying with government requests or orders.

The Myanmar Centre for Responsible Business (MCRB) has completed initial scoping and research in preparation for the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) Sector-Wide Impact Assessment (SWIA).

As part of its programme of enhancing Myanmar companies’ understanding of international standards and transparency, MCRB recently organised two half-day workshops in Yangon with a human rights and business focus.

Interview with Vicky Bowman: "The fact that civil society – including the media and parliament – now has an audible and powerful voice has been a wakeup call for companies."

As a participant on a panel at the 2nd Myanmar Upstream Summit in Yangon on 25 October 2014, Vicky Bowman made a presentation on ‘Local content – learning from experience elsewhere'.

On 24 October, Vicky Bowman made a presentation on the emerging environmental (and social) impact assessment (EIA) process in Myanmar to the working group focussed on "Investing in resource efficiency and sustainable cities".

This workshop is open to all Myanmar businesses interested in developing or improving their approach to respect for human rights, and communicating what they do to their stakeholders.

On Tuesday, 23 September, MCRB hosted a half-day workshop on “Anti-Corruption Programmes” for Myanmar businesses in Yangon. The workshop was held in collaboration with Spectrum – a Yangon-based sustainable development knowledge network.

MCRB has started work on scoping and research on its next sector-wide-impact assessment (SWIA) on ICT, to be conducted over the next six months. Lucy Purdon, Programme Support Manager (ICT) at IHRB recently visited Myanmar to train the new SWIA Team.

To follow up the first Transparency in Myanmar Enterprises (TiME/Pwint Thit Sa) report, MCRB will hold its first capacity-building workshop for Myanmar companies on 23 September with a focus on the elements of building an anti-corruption programme.

Myanmar Business Coalition on Aid (MBCA), with whom MCRB has partnered to extend its outreach to Myanmar businesses beyond Yangon, worked with MCRB to conduct a pilot survey of 128 businesses in May 2014 to understand their views on CSR.