印度亚洲公路1号线今何在 Asian Highway One mired in muddy reality
An air-conditioner? A child’s Spider-Man costume? Chinese-made plastic flowers? A bag of dried fish or a bottle of French champagne? On a typical weekday morning scores of Indian shoppers are hunting for bargains just over the border in the Myanmar town of Namphalong. They can even pay in Indian rupees.
空调机？蜘蛛侠(Spider-Man)童装？中国制造的塑料花？还是一袋干鱼或一瓶法国香槟？在一个典型的周末上午，大量印度顾客都会越过边境，到缅甸的南帕隆镇(Namphalong)去买便宜货。他们甚至可以支付印度卢比。
Dozens of porters, pushing handcarts or balancing cardboard boxes on their heads, walk steadily into Moreh on the Indian side of the frontier in the north-eastern state of Manipur, laden with mangos, onions and coconuts.
数十名行李搬运工，推着手推车或头顶纸箱(里面都装满了芒果、洋葱和椰子)，稳步走进边境线印度一侧的莫雷(Moreh)。莫雷位于印度东北部的曼尼普尔区(Manipur)。
The retail trade on foot is vigorous enough, but it is all a long way from the Indian vision of turning Moreh into a modern commercial road and rail gateway to east Asia.
这种依靠步行的零售贸易很有活力，但它距离印度的目标——把莫雷打造成东亚现代化商业的公路铁路门户——还有很大差距。
Narendra Modi, India’s prime minister, has tried to inject new vigour into the plan by rebranding New Delhi’s old “Look East” policy as “Act East”. The winding, potholed road uphill from the Manipuri capital Imphal to the border with Myanmar has been labelled hopefully with green and white AH1 signs, denoting the theoretical Asian Highway One linking Istanbul to Tokyo via Kolkata and Bangkok.
印度总理纳伦德拉莫迪(Narendra Modi)曾尝试为该方案注入新的活力，把新德里方面旧有的“向东看”(Look East)政策重新定位为“向东行动”(Act East)政策。这条由曼尼普尔区首府英帕尔(Imphal)通向印缅边境、蜿蜒曲折、崎岖不同的上坡道路，已被满怀希望地挂上了绿白相间的“AH1”标志。AH1是指理论上的从伊斯坦布尔经由加尔各答和曼谷通往东京的亚洲公路1号线。
Yet the slow pace of road and railway building, the prohibition of cross-border truck traffic, rebel insurgencies, the obstacle course of intrusive military checkpoints in India and the reluctance of the governments on either side of the frontier to embrace free trade has left locals sceptical about the future.
不过，公路铁路建设的步伐缓慢、跨境卡车交通被禁、叛乱迭起、印度境内突兀的军事检查点构成的交通障碍路段，以及两国政府不愿接受自由贸易，都令当地人对未来贸易增长感到怀疑。
“Act East or Look East — it’s a bluff,” says Amar Yumnam, economics professor at Manipur University, who compares India unfavourably with China when it comes to the building of roads and railways for trading with its neighbours. He gives credit to Mr Modi for talking to India’s neighbours about investment and development, but says the message has yet to percolate down to the relevant bureaucrats.
“不管向东看还是向东行动，那都是虚张声势，”曼尼普尔大学(Manipur University)经济学教授阿马尔鄠纳姆(Amar Yumnam)说。谈到建设公路铁路、促进与邻国贸易问题上，云纳姆认为印度比不上中国。他称赞莫迪与邻国进行投资与开发谈判，但表示，这一信息还没有向下传递到相关官员那里。
“In 1994, a [Myanmar-India] border trade agreement was signed. The same day they signed a security agreement, and that agreement has been more prominent. In Moreh there’s no visibility of any kind of infrastructure...戠甀琀 you’ll face all the inconveniences related to security.”
“1994年签署了（缅印）边境贸易协议。同一天，他们还签署了一项安全协议，安全协议一直更重要。在莫雷，我们根本看不到任何种类的基础设施……但你将承受跟安全相关的所有不便利之处。”
Like Bangladesh, which now separates India’s north-eastern states from the rest of the subcontinent, India and Myanmar (then Burma) were both part of the British Raj. But mountainous terrain and half a century of military dictatorship in Myanmar from 1962 left the country largely cut off from its Indian neighbour to the west. Bilateral trade has recently increased to reach more than $2bn a year, but only about 1 per cent of that is by land.
就像把印度东北部各邦跟南亚次大陆分隔开来的孟加拉国一样，印度与缅甸也都曾是英属印度的组成部分。但多山地形，加上缅甸从1962年以来半个世纪的军事独裁，使得缅甸基本上跟西面的邻国印度断绝了来往。近来缅印双边贸易有所增加，年贸易额突破了20亿美元，但其中仅有约1%是通过陆路实现的。
“Indo-Myanmar trade is not up to the mark,” says Mahesh Singh, an Indian customs inspector at the Moreh border. “Only betel nut is imported, and in exchange wheat flour and bleach are exported — mainly these three items.”
“目前印缅贸易达不到标准，”莫雷边境的印度海关检查员马赫什鬠格(Mahesh Singh)说。“印度只进口槟榔果，出口小麦面和漂白剂——主要就这三种物品。”
With border trade restricted to a barter system — rather than money — for just 62 approved items, and exclusively for domestic products made either in Myanmar or India, it is no surprise that only about 30 truckloads of goods a month are officially crossing the frontier.
由于边境贸易仅限于易货贸易——而不使用货币——仅针对62种获批物品，并且仅限于缅甸或印度境内生产的物品，所以每个月只有约30辆卡车的货物跨过边境，也就不足为怪了。
Asked whether Mr Modi’s “Act East” drive has galvanised trade, one surprised customs officer responds as he stamps more papers: “But that’s just government policy. We just do our work.”
在被问及莫迪的“向东行动”计划是否促进了贸易时，一名吃惊的海关官员一边在更多文件上盖章，一边回答：“但那只是政府的政策。我们只做我们的事。”
