The article "Uneven development stifling Myanmar" published in the Global Times Friday reminded me of my recent trip to this changing country, including big cities like Yangon and Mandalay and northern states such as Kachin. The author warned against the "growing gap between rich and poor and the gap between the urban and rural populations" which I felt deeply during my trip.

The much-lauded reforms implemented since President U Thein Sein took office have prompted many changes in Myanmar. Some foreign investors have already explored this "last frontier market," which is seen as having huge potential for business opportunities. But it's also noticeable that some of this curiosity hasn't translated into real investment due to poor infrastructure, an unsound commercial environment, untapped human capital and an uncertain political future.

Big cities like Yangon, Mandalay and Nay Pyi Taw are beginning to thrive. A surging number of visitors including both tourists and businesspeople feel like they are in big metropolises when they walk on newly-renovated and widened roads, seeing lines of shiny vehicles speeding by and newly built foreign-branded shopping malls crowded with customers. However, problems like traffic congestion, pollution, and a lack of parking spaces are also on the rise.

The problems of the reforms failing to reach the massive rural areas, especially the north of Myanmar, are obvious. In those places, Myanmar's reforms seem a world away.

A local resident in a village 40 kilometers away from Myitkyina, the capital city of Kachin State, told me how hard life is for his family, who live without electricity and farm on lands with poor soil, low yields and a lack of irrigation.

The old man in his 50s also complained that his shabby wooden hut was frequently trapped in water like an island when days-long rains come in the rainy season.

His is not an exceptional case. Many of the rural population of northern Myanmar live hard lives, and the situation became worse when fighting between the Kachin Independence Army and the government army broke out, with some even ending up with no food.

Northern Myanmar is the country's most resource-rich region and of great geographical significance since it connects China and India and is part of the Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar (BCIM) economic corridor. However, analysts see it as a weak point in building the BCIM economic corridor because of poor transportation, lack of electricity and unresolved ethnic conflicts.  

Reform is a comprehensive project and it's a particularly difficult and complicated task for Myanmar given the country's backwardness due to decades of isolation from the international community, its ethnic conflicts and great divergences over how to carry out reform and what its priorities should be.

Some have called for more importance to be attached to infrastructure construction and luring business investment so as to boost the economy, which some argue are more important than human rights and political reforms. 

Myanmar is a latecomer as a reformer and it has just begun its course as an increasing number of problems will emerge, such as the growing wealth gap and uneven development between urban and rural regions.

The reform designers of Myanmar are shouldering an unprecedented and difficult task, and should face up to these problems in their initial stages.

Ding Li, a reporter based in Beijing