The Hukawng Valley ( my, ဟူးကောင်းချိုင့်ဝှမ်း; also spelt Hukaung Valley) is an isolated valley in

Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John Wells explai ...

, roughly in area. It is located in Tanaing Township in the

Myitkyina District Myitkyina District ( my, မြစ်ကြီးနားခရိုင်) is a district of the Kachin State in northern Burma (Myanmar). The capital lies at Myitkyina. It is the largest district in the country by land area. Townships The dis ...

of Kachin State in the northernmost part of the country. It has the Hukaung Valley Wildlife Sanctuary.

Rivers

The rivers draining into the Hukawng Valley, the Tanai Kha, the Tabye, the Tawan, and the Turong, form the headwaters of the Chindwin River.

Protected area

Ringed by steep

mountain range A mountain range or hill range is a series of mountains or hills arranged in a line and connected by high ground. A mountain system or mountain belt is a group of mountain ranges with similarity in form, structure, and alignment that have arise ...

s to the north, east and west, the valley is known as a habitat of

tigers The tiger (''Panthera tigris'') is the largest living cat species and a member of the genus ''Panthera''. It is most recognisable for its dark vertical stripes on orange fur with a white underside. An apex predator, it primarily preys on un ...

, but encroachment by man has greatly decreased their numbers, to perhaps as few as 100 animals. In 2004, the government established the world's largest tiger preserve in the Hukawng Valley, the Hukaung Valley Wildlife Sanctuary, with an area of approximately ; later, the Sanctuary was extended to 21,800 km², making it the largest protected area in mainland Southeast Asia. The government's establishment of the preserve was accomplished in cooperation with the Kachin Independent Army, a formerly-rebel group that inhabits the region. The extremely rare leaf muntjac, also known as the ''phet-gyi'', dwarf deer or leaf deer, also lives in the Hukawng.

Industries

Major industry includes

amber Amber is fossilized tree resin that has been appreciated for its color and natural beauty since Neolithic times. Much valued from antiquity to the present as a gemstone, amber is made into a variety of decorative objects."Amber" (2004). In ...

and

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile me ...

mining Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the Earth, usually from an ore body, lode, vein, seam, reef, or placer deposit. The exploitation of these deposits for raw material is based on the economic ...

; most gold mines are now depleted, but the toxic chemicals from former gold extraction have not been cleared, and are seeping into the groundwater.

Discoveries

The valley is well known for

Burmese amber Burmese amber, also known as Burmite or Kachin amber, is amber from the Hukawng Valley in northern Myanmar. The amber is dated to around 100 million years ago, during the latest Albian to earliest Cenomanian ages of the mid-Cretaceous period. The ...

, a type of

dating back to the

Cretaceous The Cretaceous ( ) is a geological period that lasted from about 145 to 66 million years ago (Mya). It is the third and final period of the Mesozoic Era, as well as the longest. At around 79 million years, it is the longest geological period of ...

period, around 99 million years ago.

History

During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, the

Ledo Road The Ledo Road (from Ledo, Assam, India to Kunming, Yunnan, China) was an overland connection between India and China, built during World War II to enable the Western Allies to deliver supplies to China and aid the war effort against Japan ...

was built by the

US Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

across the Hukawng Valley, largely by African-American engineer battalions and Chinese laborers, in order to supply the armies of the Republic of China, who were then allied with the

Western Allies The Allies, formally referred to as the United Nations from 1942, were an international military coalition formed during the Second World War (1939–1945) to oppose the Axis powers, led by Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, and Fascist Italy ...

in the war against the

Empire of Japan The also known as the Japanese Empire or Imperial Japan, was a historical nation-state and great power that existed from the Meiji Restoration in 1868 until the enactment of the post-World War II Constitution of Japan, 1947 constitu ...

References

External links

World's Biggest Tiger Reserve
Valleys of Myanmar World War II sites in Burma Kachin State {{Burma-geo-stub