Myanmar has laid down a project to draw a geological indicator map for Yangon to guide building construction work in the capital as a precaution against quake, the local 7-Day News reported Thursday.

Scholars and experts will start work soon on the detailed micro-zonation indicator map, the Myanmar Engineering Society was quotedas saying.

An Engineering Committee on Earthquake involving Earthquake Engineers Association, Meteorology and Hydrology Department, Yangon University and Yangon Technical College has been set up forthe move, it said.

The project will take at least one year and will be extended toother major cities of Mandalay, Bago and Phyu, it added.

Meanwhile, Myanmar is also undertaking a coastal storm and tidal surge forecast project for improved weather prediction services. The project, being implemented with the assistance of the Honolulu-based PACON International (the Pacific Congress on Marine Science Technology), involves the utilization of numerical prediction method to provide advance warning of storm and tidal surge.

According to official reports, the violent tsunami, triggered by a deadly Indian Ocean earthquake on last Dec. 26, killed 64 people with 56 injured so far in Myanmar's coastal areas. The tidal wave destroyed over 600 houses in 29 villages, leaving 3,460 people homeless in six divisions and states -- Tanintharyi, Yangon,Bago, Ayeyawaddy, Rakhine and Shan (South). However, no casualty in the southernmost Cocogyun island was reported where 976 people live.