“The whole Kaladan project is expected to be completed by 2016 or later, and work on the waterway is expected to be completed this June,” said a senior official from the Myanmar Port Authority.
The committee previously announced that work on the waterway was to be completed by the end of this March. Officials said import procedures were the cause of the delay.
The construction of six vessels by the government of India as part of the Kaladan project is also 80 percent complete, officials said.
The multi-modal project aims to create a trade route between Sittwe Port, Rakhine State, and the land-locked region of Mizoram in northeastern India via river and road transport.
The waterway phase involves constructing an integrated port and inland water transport system, including dredging a navigational channel 158 kilometres along the Kaladan River from Sittwe to Paletwa.