YANGON - China and Myanmar companies have reached an agreement on production of 10-15 ton heavy duty trucks in Myanmar, the State-run paper the New Light of Myanmar reported Wednesday.

China National Heavy Duty Truck Group Co Ltd (CNHTC) and General Heavy Machinery Industry signed the contract on the above project in Nay Pyi Taw Tuesday.

The contract signing ceremony was the handover of technology for manufacturing of 10-15 ton TE-31 Utility Truck (Medium) at No 11 General Heavy Machinery Factory (Yangon) under No 1 General Heavy Machinery to be implemented with the loan of $20 million granted by Preferential Buyer Credit Loan of the People's Republic of China, the report said.

The project will be completed during this year, mainly producing machineries such as 10-15 ton (6x4) trucks, water tankers, oil tankers and concrete mixers, and fire engines etc.

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The 90 percent of machine parts used in the production will be from the factories of the Ministry of Industry-2, it said.  

According to other report, altogether 82,785 motor vehicles have been produced by Myanmar's 18 industrial zones up to June, 2010.

Of the total foreign investment injected in over two decades, China's investment has now topped with $9.603 billion, overtaking Thailand which once stood at $9.568 billion in the foreign investment line-up previously.

According to Chinese official statistics, bilateral trade between China and Myanmar totaled $4.444 billion in 2010, an increase of 53.2 percent correspondingly.

There are 170 Chinese companies investing in Myanmar according to the figures.