Examination of social economic impact on the energy consumption of Myanmar

Abstract

Southeast Asia country are mostly classified as developing country. One of the aspects that ASEAN concern is the energy poverty problem. Based on the statistics known, around 127 million people in the SEA facing lack of access of electricity. Besides that, 228 million people highly depending traditional biomass to fulfil their daily needs. Myanmar is one of the sixth poorest country in the SEA. The access of electricity in Myanmar are low and experience slow improvement over a decade. Energy policy had been drafted and implemented by Myanmar government. However, the result is no significant. This paper aims to analyze the social economic impact on the energy consumption of Myanmar. The aspect of analyze include energy use, foreign direct investment, population growth, industry value added, GDP per capita growth and trade. Multivariate analysis method adopts which includes descriptive statistics analysis, unit root test, Johannsen cointegration analysis, vector error correction model and Granger causality test. The result shows unidirectional Granger causality for energy consumption with all the aspects. Analyzed data play important role in the future policy planning. Policies such as renewable energy policy, reducing energy prices, taxes and subsidies can help in increasing energy consumption which will bring up other social economic.