A dispute between Chinese trucking companies and Mongolian officials over health insurance for drivers has halted coal and copper transport at the remote Gants Mod crossing for over a week.

The mine is once again under political pressure, with Mongolian politicians claiming the country has seen too little benefit from its massive expenditure. The high costs of financing the mine mean that the government will not see its share of profits for several years, although Ulan Bator does receive tax revenues.

Also this week, Rio Tinto’s Canadian-listed subsidiary Turquoise Hill, which holds the shares in the Oyu Tolgoi mine, revealed a new bill for $155m in back taxes, following a Mongolian audit of 2013-2015 tax payments by the mine. The company said it is disputing the assessment.

The visit is made at the invitation of National Assembly (NA) Chairwoman Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan, said the NA Committee for External Affairs.

Vietnam and Mongolia have developed long-standing friendship and multi-faceted cooperation in various fields since they established diplomatic ties in November 1954.

The disruption, caused by protests on the Chinese side of the border, come barely 48 hours after it was revealed that Mongolia had sought $US155 million of allegedly unpaid taxes from Oyu Tolgoi.

The Rio subsidiary that operates Oyu Tolgoi, Turquoise Hill Resources, said the protests had been underway for 10 days and had forced the company to declare force majeure on its copper shipments to Chinese customers.

"The placement of protesters vehicles prevented any traffic from safely traversing the border...and has continued to do so," the company said in a statement.

The focus of the protest was unclear, but Turquoise Hill described the protesters as coal transporters.

It is not the first time tensions on the border between Mongolia and China have caused problems for Oyu Tolgoi.

In December 2016 the Chinese province of Inner Mongolia, which shares a border with the nation of Mongolia, imposed new tariffs on Mongolian goods entering China.

That incident caused copper shipments from Oyu Tolgoi to be temporarily interrupted.

Turquoise Hill owns 66 per cent of Oyu Tolgoi, with the Mongolian government owing the balance.

Rio owns 50.79 per cent of Turquoise Hill, and an expansion of Oyu Tolgoi ranks as arguably Rio's most important growth project worldwide.

Bottles, bags or cups: single-use plastics represent half of the items found on EU beaches but can take 500 years to breakdown into smaller pieces. Later this year, we will come forward with a proposal on single-use plastics #PlasticsStrategy

An additional fund of €100 million ($122.4 million) has been committed to finance efficient recycling technology, and to boost innovation in plastic recycling.

Global production of plastics has increased twentyfold since the 1960s, according to the EU. It estimated that every year Europeans generate 25 million tons of plastic waste, of which less than 30 percent is collected for recycling.

“If we don't change the way we produce and use plastics, there will be more plastics than fish in our oceans by 2050. We must stop plastics getting into our water, our food, and even our bodies,” said EU Commission First Vice President Frans Timmermans.

We also want to restrict the use of microplastics intentionally added in cosmetics so that they don't end up in the sea and eventually in our food. #PlasticsStrategy

Last month Beijing banned the import of 24 types of waste from Western countries, saying the US and EU countries have flouted waste standard rules.

Notifying the World Trade Organization about its waste import ban, Chinese authorities said “that large amounts of dirty wastes or even hazardous wastes are mixed in the solid waste that can be used as raw materials. This polluted China's environment seriously.”

In 2017, Chinese manufacturers imported a whopping 7.3 million metric tons of waste metal, plastics, and paper worth $18 billion mostly from developed countries, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

The UK exported over 2.7 million tons of plastic waste to the Chinese mainland and Hong Kong-based recyclers in the last five years. Data showed that over one million ton of plastics worth $495 million have been exported to China by the US last year. The EU countries alone shipped 87 percent of the recycled plastic to China.

The annual study aims to give the 21 aimags of Mongolia a chance to identify their advantages and disadvantages, evaluate their capacities and determine their long-term development policies.

Opening the press conference on Wednesday, P.Tsagaan, Chairman of Board of the Economic Policy and Competitiveness Research Center said, “Competitiveness isn’t the name of financial capacity, it is a different characteristic. There is a common model of self-improvement based on such reports and assessment.” The study took account of 181 different indicators on each aimag based on statistical reports and survey. The Competitiveness of Provinces report has been released for the sixth time this year.

According to P.Tsagaan, who briefed the outcome of the study, the average competitiveness score of aimags decreased to 66 last year. The western region of Mongolia has seen the most significant decline in terms of competitiveness. “The governance performance indicator has also seen a major decline. In other words, the people’s trust in government is declining,” he said.

In 2017, economic indicators of five aimags increased in terms of amount whereas those of 15 aimags decreased. Orkhon aimag took the first place with 13.6 percent economic growth. Umnugobi aimag saw a 0.7 percent decline in its economy.
Kh.Aminaa

One of the deposits is a lithium deposit of Khukh Del. Alkali Metal Mongolia LLC has been granted the special permission to operate in the surveyed part of the deposit. However, the company is yet to start operations at present. Located in the Ulziit soum of Dundgobi aimag, the deposit has an estimated resource of 644.3 tons of ore with average grade of 0.153 percent lithium (992.2 thousand tons). Lithium is considered the lightest metal and is highly reactive. Therefore, it is mainly used for smartphone and electronic instrument batteries.

Along with the lithium deposit, a project on rare-earth elements is being implemented in Zavkhan soum, Uvs aimag. Geo-Info LLC, a national geological consulting firm, holds the special permission of the deposit, which reserves zircon and other rare-earth elements. The MRPAM informed that a report is being prepared on the exploration of the licensed area.

Another prospective project is the Uranium deposit in Ulaanbadrakh soum, Dornogobi aimag. Areva Mongol LLC holds the operating license of the deposit and is facing local resistance; thus, delaying the project significantly.

In addition, investments projects on copper and gold deposits in Kharmagtai has been increasing continuously. Xanadu Mines, an ASX-listed company, disclosed the drilling report near the end of 2017 and assessed “satisfactory”.

The list continued with two deposits in Uvs and Gobi-Altai aimags, where geological and exploration surveys were least conducted. Mongolian Resource Corporation owns the special permission to operate in the molybdenum and tungsten deposits.

Furthermore, Ivanhoe Mines Mongolia LLC has conducted an exploration between 2004-2009, which was then bought by Kincora Copper Ltd in 2012. The exploration of Bronze Fox Project has identified ore samples containing 0.5-1.5 percent copper. MRPAM also informed that a significant amount of gold can be extracted from the deposit. Presently, 1.5 grams of gold were found per ton of soil at depths of 1200 meters.

The main challenges for these projects have become the social licensing and local resistances. If these problems are resolved, the projects will attract guaranteed investments.

B.Bayartogtokh, B.Tugsbilig

Industry representatives say that companies are taking out loans in order to expand their operations and they end up with a deficit because of interest owed on loans.

The director of News Remicon LLC noted that the construction sector is expected to be back on track due to prices for exported building materials rising in 2018.

Investment in construction and building repair services in Mongolia totaled 3.1 trillion MNT in 2017 based on the preliminary results of an industry analysis.

The report’s findings and recommendations were discussed with representatives of state authorities, including the election administration, the parliamentary working group on the election law and the media regulatory authority, as well as civil society representatives. Discussions focused on specific steps that can be taken to follow up on ODIHR recommendations.

ODIHR experts and the authorities discussed the need for a comprehensive review of the legal framework for elections to address existing gaps and to empower relevant institutions with effective oversight powers and clear jurisdiction on activities throughout the electoral process. Particular emphasis was given to granting the General Election Commission broader authority to issue regulations and provide additional guidance to lower-level commissions.

Other recommendations discussed were to introduce well-defined and transparent criteria for the appointment of lower-level election officials and to broaden reporting requirements for campaign finance.

“The window between elections in Mongolia is open and we encouragingly look to the authorities for initiatives to enhance the conduct of democratic elections,” said Steven Martin, Senior Adviser of the ODIHR Elections Department. “A meaningful and inclusive review of electoral legislation could further strengthen confidence in the institutions responsible for elections and serve as an example of good practice in the OSCE region. ODIHR is ready to support these efforts.”

The expert team also discussed recommendations related to lifting undue restrictions on the right to stand for office, including the prohibition of candidates who are independent or from non-parliamentary parties. They drew attention to the need to enhance the media’s coverage of elections and improve the process for addressing complaints and appeals.

The discussions also covered possible next steps for co-operation between the authorities and ODIHR, including through the provision of expert opinions on future legal amendments and support to Mongolia’s initiative of establishing a regional training centre for election observation.

The follow-up visit followed an official invitation from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. All OSCE participating States have committed themselves to following up on ODIHR's election assessments and recommendations.

On January 16, the first Joint Coordination Committee (JCC) of the Project was held at Blue Sky Hotel, chaired by Ts.Tsengel, State Secretary of the Ministry of Environment and Tourism (MET) and attended by the corresponding officials from the MET, the Environment and Climate Fund (ECF) and JICA. A kickoff workshop followed in the afternoon for the relevant stakeholders, including donors and government organizations.

The first JCC addressed some issues related to GHG, such as United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)’s reporting requirement, domestic context of Mongolia to the GHG inventories and its current challenges. In addition, attendees were informed about an overview to the Project.

In brief, the project will be implemented for 4 years with the aim of achieving overall goal of regularly improvement of GHG inventory with the cooperation of relevant institutions of Mongolia.

The Project outputs focusing on activity data on Energy sector and developing parameters in the Land Use, Land Use and Forestry sector as well as some job training activities collaborated between JICA and ECF experts.
source: JICA