The amber mines are located in the Hukawng Valley of Kachin, Myanmar’s northernmost state (also known for other resources such as jade, gold, and wood). In local dialect, the remote jungle valley is known as the “Place of the Devil.” As Xing explained, the mines in Hukawng have existed for 100 years, but for decades they were relatively shallow. When ruby miners moved into the area from the south 10 years ago, they used their more sophisticated technology to dig deeper, and began to find new deposits of amber about 100 meters down.

War kept international investors out of the region—the area’s Kachin people have been fighting for independence from Myanmar since 1962—but during a cease-fire in the 1990s, a Canadian mining company started to work in the mines, and as scientists and jewelry makers recognized the size and age of the Burmese deposits, interest grew. Around 2010, China’s own amber mines were tapped out, and the production of Burmese amber grew. Today an estimated 10 tons of amber is taken out of Burmese mines every year.

Xing told the group that tens of thousands of people work in the Kachin mines, many of them teenagers (the mine shafts are so narrow that only slender people can fit into them, going two at a time), and that hundreds are killed every month when the mines flood or cave in. The area is also loaded with land mines from the ongoing conflict between the Kachin separatists and the Burmese army, so even on the surface, it’s easy for locals to get hurt.

Once Burmese amber is extracted from the mines, it’s transported—usually via elephant—over pitted paths to trucks that deliver it to markets in the south of China. The generals who control the area sometimes alert Xing when an interesting inclusion is found in the amber.