During its regular session on March 7, 2023, the Cabinet made the following decisions:

The Management of Seized and Confiscated Assets Discussed

The Government Resolution on Health Care Services was approved. Accordingly, the Cabinet made a decision to spend the seized and confiscated assets associated with corruption on improving the medical services for mothers and children, cancer and organ transplant procedures through investing in required medical equipment and building and expanding hospitals. Moreover, the Minister of Health was tasked to evaluate the buildings and structures confiscated due to the corruption, study the possibility of using them for medical purposes and present the results at the Cabinet meeting.

Health Promotion Centers to be Provided with Flexible Endoscopes

Minister of Health Mr. Chinzorig, Minister of Finance Mr. Javkhlan and Governors of the aimags were tasked to intensify the process of the preventive and early-detection checkups, a nationwide campaign and provide the health promotion centers with flexible endoscopes. According to the decision made at the Cabinet session, Minister of Education and Science Mr. Enkh-Amgalan will be responsible for increasing the health insurance coverages of students and creating favorable conditions to enable students to get an early health screening. Ensuring the smooth operation of the online system of health care organizations and the continuous service readiness of the hardware will be the responsibility of the Minister of Digital Development and Communications Mr. Uchral. In addition, Minister of Health was tasked to develop a plan for “Tooth” event and conduct feasibility study to establish National Dentistry Center.

Minister of Justice and Home Affairs Nyambaatar: We will bring overseas fugitives back to the jury and hold them responsible

The Government of Mongolia has declared 2023 as the “Year to Combat Corruption" and launched the five “W” operations to combat corruption. Within the framework of the “Wasp” operation, one of the five ‘W” operations, overseas fugitives will be brought back to the jury pursuant to the international agreements and Mongolian laws, ensuring the streamlined process of investigation.

Erdenes Tavantolgoi JSC, Erdenet Mining cooperation SOE, Mongolrostsvetmet SOE and Darkhan Metallurgical Plant JSC have contributed USD 443.1 million to the state budget since the beginning of this year.

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy and Development Mr. Khurelbaatar presented on the implementation of the Government Resolution No. 362 on Measures to be Taken to Increase the Foreign Exchange Reserves, dated October 5, 2022 at the Cabinet meeting.

As of the end of February 2023, total exports of coal, iron ore, and oil have reached 8.7 million tons, 0.9 million tons, and 0.8 million barrels, increasing by 3.6 times, 50 percent, and 100 percent compared to the same period last year, respectively.

The Foreign exchange reserves reached at USD 3.4 billion, an increase of 21% compared to the end of September 2022. Erdenes Tavantolgoi JSC, Erdenet Mining cooperation SOE, Mongolrostsvetmet SOE and Darkhan Metallurgical Plant JSC have contributed USD 443.1 million to the state budget since the beginning of this year.

According to the “Procedures on Open E-Trade of Coal for Export”, the first e-auction of the coal for export was successfully organized on February 9. Since then, 204.8 thousand tons of coal have been traded, amounting to USD 37.3 million through five online auctions.

Mongolia received 42 thousand tourists in the first two months of this year

The Government of Mongolia has announced 2023-2025 as the “Years to visit Mongolia” to promote the tourism sector. In this regard, Minister of Environment and Tourism Mr. Bat-Erdene presented on the process of preparatory work. According to the Minister’s presentation, our country has received 43,311 tourists from Russia, Korea and China.

Anyone old enough to remember the VSE will recall it was the premiere playground for mining stock promoters, smooth talkers and crooks who would sell investors on the promise of striking it rich, just as soon as this or that highly speculative resource sector play turned out to be the genuine El Dorado.

There were some honest-to-goodness El Dorados, lest the legendary Eskay Creek gold bonanza be forgotten, but right alongside the winners were the characters of ill repute, pumping the price of otherwise worthless penny stocks and cashing out ahead of the inevitable crash. Forbes magazine knew the score, and famously dubbed the VSE the “scam capital of the world” in its May 1989 issue.

“Each year it sucks billions of dollars out of legitimate markets by inducing dupes to invest in mysterious outfits making hydro-douches, computerized golf courses and airborne farm equipment,” Joe Queenan said in his piece for Forbes.

Sometimes it may have even seemed that one company was into all those things, and more, at one time or another in its various corporate incarnations, and that strategy continues today.

For example, Adastra Labs Ltd. did not get hooked on hydro-douches, but during the past 35 years — as Consolidated Gulfside Resources Ltd., Gulfside Industries Ltd., Gulfside Minerals Ltd. and Arrowstar Resources Ltd. — it has been an Oklahoma oil and gas player, dabbled in Mongolian coal, leaned into web-based music accounting gizmos, eyed gold in northern British Columbia, and trumpeted the ecological-friendly transformative potential of recycled rubber.

Chief executives have come and gone as fast as the name changes, including one who went so far as getting himself banned by the BC Securities Commission, and another who was the commander of a United States nuclear naval submarine.

Arrowstar Resources became Adastra Labs Holdings Ltd. by way of a reverse takeover, a nifty regulatory shortcut for a private company to go public without all the regulatory headaches. With the change in name came a change in focus from mining to cannabis, a new listing on the Canadian Securities Exchange and, lately, a new chief executive at the helm named Michael (Mike) Forbes.

He is a pharmacist by trade, and claims to have an “honorary MBA” from Western University’s Ivey Business School — in his corporate bio, on the company’s website, in company filings with stock exchange regulators, as well as in polite conversation — but the university said he has no such degree.

But what Adastra Labs legitimately has is a Health Canada licence to possess, produce, package and sell cocaine. That is not a typo, and it could be a potential home run for investors, assuming they believe, as Forbes does, that the only way to win the war on drugs is to legalize, regulate and tax them, thus ensuring a safe source of user supply.

And if that scenario sounds even more far-fetched than airborne farm equipment, it isn’t, necessarily. B.C. is less than two months into a three-year decriminalization pilot project to address a toxic drug supply epidemic that claimed more than 2,200 lives in the province in 2022, according to government data. The project permits drug users to possess up to 2.5 grams of opioids, such as cocaine, crack cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine and fentanyl.

Where to get the coke? Enter Adastra Labs if all goes according to the future Forbes envisions.

“I was looking at it, thinking, ‘OK, where is the government going to get all its safe supply?'” he said in late February.

A few days later, however, Health Canada clarified in an email that the company’s licence does not permit it to “sell to the general public,” and only allows for the sale “to other licence holders who have cocaine listed on their licence, pharmacists, practitioners, hospitals, or the holder of a section 56(1) exemption for research purposes.”

Forbes made the same distinction, but a company press release dated Feb. 22 did not. An investor, in theory, may have read the release and perhaps reasonably concluded that Adastra Labs could legally sell cocaine to anybody.

The company clarified that this was not indeed the case in a subsequent press release issued nine days after the first, but only after Health Canada contacted Adastra Labs to remind it of the very “narrow parameters of their licence,” and after a public outcry erupted around the spectre of legalized, commercialized coke, a hullabaloo amplified by a Canadian Press report, which peaked when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau weighed in from Ottawa to confirm the government was not looking at commercializing the drug.

In the interim, Adastra’s stock price had gone on a bender, doubling to $1.65 by the morning of March 3, just a few hours prior to the company clarifying its licence conditions. It is the sort of whoops-a-daisy the ghosts of VSE’s yore are likely getting a chuckle out of. By midday March 7, the stock was trading for around 50 cents, where it remains.

At the heart of the controversy is a 43-year-old CEO who described himself as someone with a “busy mind.” It is a busyness reflected by the number of business ventures Forbes has been involved with, according to his personal web page for the Forbes Group. They include storage facilities, craft beer, bubble soccer and a chain of drugstores he “bootstrapped” into existence, he said, sanding down the shelves himself prior to opening his first outlet on Vancouver Island at age 24.

“I worked relentlessly,” he said. “I didn’t have any hand-me-downs from mom and dad. I had to hustle.”

The hard work apparently paid off when Forbes was accepted into and successfully completed the QuantumShift program in 2017, a rigorous, five-day developmental program for some of Canada’s most promising entrepreneurs delivered by the Ivey Business School.

QuantumShift is for “CEO business owners who are past startup, and only 40 entrepreneurs are accepted into this program annually,” a university spokesperson says. Program participants are not, however, awarded MBAs, honorary or otherwise.

Forbes said he had been “led to believe that it was an MBA program” when questioned about its provenance. He also said he had a plaque on his wall at his home in Victoria and could take a photo of it as proof, but that he would not be home for another “two weeks.”

But he added that he “never got to where I am today because of the letter behind my name, I promise you that. It is about what I have done, so the way I lead companies, too, is to remove all titles and go from your ability.”

But is claiming to have an honorary MBA in regulatory filings an offence? A British Columbia Securities Commission (BCSC) spokesperson said that should the exchange watchdog have reason to believe disclosed information was incorrect, and the information was deemed “material,” it might ask the CEO to provide proof of the honorary degree, and if the CEO couldn’t provide proof, it might ask for a correction.

I didn’t have any hand-me-downs from mom and dad. I had to hustle

MICHAEL FORBES

How about Adastra Labs’ Feb. 22 press release that implied the company could sell cocaine to anyone— a release the company clarified nine days later at Health Canada’s urging, and amid prime ministerial hue and cry?

“Public companies are required to provide timely, accurate disclosure of material information about their businesses so investors can make informed decisions. It is illegal to misstate material information, including by omission,” the regulator said, noting it doesn’t comment on its investigations, planned or otherwise.

“If the BCSC has reason to believe an issuer’s disclosure is misleading or inaccurate, the BCSC could seek more information from the issuer to decide whether the issuer needs to file amended disclosure. Other steps could include issuing a cease trade order, a temporary order or a notice of hearing (an allegation that a person or entity violated the Securities Act).”

Having an error on one’s resumé, of course, isn’t the most wicked sin ever committed by a chief executive, particularly one who is the head of a company peddling its wares on a junior stock exchange.

The VSE is no more, but the highly speculative, ripe-for-manipulation home to honest and not-so-honest corporations keeps merrily hustling along on junior exchanges. The VSE merged with several second-tier Canadian stock exchanges to form the Canadian Venture Exchange in 1999, which subsequently evolved into the TSX Venture Exchange.

It is the Wild West of investing, said Robert Yalden, a corporate law and finance professor at Queen’s University law school in Kingston, Ont., which can attract some not terribly “reputable” people who can operate in what amounts to a market grey zone, preying upon unwitting investors, as well as those who presumably can’t resist swinging for the fences.

It is an environment where investors best beware, understanding that the odds of lassoing the next Amazon.com Inc. amid a rodeo awash in high-probability failures, is highly improbable, while the danger of encountering a ne’er-do-well sort is not exactly nil.

But junior exchanges aren’t solely a sea for the suckers and the sharks, Yalden said. They are, warts and all, a long-standing, free market where legitimate companies, struggling to raise the kind of capital they need to grow, can get their hands on some money, while offering potential shareholders an out should they decide to sell to another willing buyer.

“We need junior exchanges to support the capital-raising process for emerging companies in all sectors, including mining and tech,” he said.

Part of the thrill for many investors is simply being in the game, and knowing there is always a chance, however slim, that the thing that seems too good to be true comes true and makes all those sages who bought in at a nickel look like a bunch of Einsteins.

So, what, exactly, is Adastra Labs selling? A cocaine dealers’ licence aside, cannabis is the company’s bread and butter. One cannabis industry insider, who requested anonymity, described the company today as being capably run and “focused on delivering products.”

That is a refreshing change, since delivering on anything has historically proved challenging for an outfit that was originally formed in 1987. The Mongolian coal mine certainly did not pan out, and was instead dogged by issues around disclosure, and a tiff among shareholders over who actually owned the mine.

The company’s short-lived interest in music accounting software in the early 2000s was another bust, orchestrated by Jack Wasserman, the CEO at the time. Among his predecessors was Owen Richman, who doubled as president and director, and ran afoul of the BCSC for some bogus invoices in the 1990s. He was found to be “unacceptable to the exchange as a director or officer of any company listed on the exchange” following an investigation by the regulator.

The company’s biography has honourable men, too. Andy Hale, a former nuclear submarine commander, once prowled the Pacific Ocean in a 560-foot submersible designed for “stealth,” with an arsenal of Tomahawk cruise missiles at his fingertips. The 60-year-old American today works at a family winery in Abottsford, B.C.

Hale is polite and friendly in conversation, but not one for chatting much about his time at Adastra Labs. He said he came aboard when it was a privately owned enterprise to get it “operational,” working through its cannabis licensing agreements, and what-not, before moving on in March 2021.

He also shared a story about a reunion at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. After former classmates learned he was the CEO of a cannabis company, the reaction was more or less split between those who thought it was “awesome” and those who walked away without saying anything at all.

But withholding comment is not part of Dana Larsen’s personal make-up. The outspoken Vancouver drug policy reform activist runs Get Your Drugs Tested, a Vancouver lab where drug users can get their drugs tested for contamination. He said the view from the addiction frontlines in Vancouver is grim.

“People are dying on a regular basis,” he said.

Most of the deaths occur among opiate users due to fentanyl. Larsen estimates about one in every 100 cocaine samples the lab analyzes is contaminated with fentanyl, a potentially lethal additive. Street cocaine can also be cut with other substances such as talc and levamisole, a veterinary drug that won’t kill an addict in one go, but is deleterious to their health over time.

Adastra Labs is licensed to possess up to 250 grams of cocaine. Were that cocaine to be sold on the street, Larsen estimates it would fetch about $25,000.

Larsen’s view is that were cocaine to be legalized and commercialized, “the real money” would be in coca-based drinks, and not snortable powder.

“In South America, they typically consume coca in teas, or else they chew the leaves, and it is still stimulating,” he said.

Maybe therein lies the long game for a company that has been around for a long time in one guise or another. Adastra Labs is legally allowed to possess coca leaves under its Health Canada licence.

It is early days, and Forbes said he wants to get around a table with “the government” to try to find a “solution to save more lives.” It is about “harm reduction,” he said.

The first time Forbes tried cannabis he was in his mid-30s. He said he has never used cocaine, but the scientists in his lab are going to be making it, and someday, when public attitudes shift, and the Gordian knot of government red tape unspools, he can imagine cocaine being sold at a government-type outlet near you.

“The laws aren’t there, yet,” Forbes said. “What I can tell you is, I can import from other countries, I can produce it and I can possess it.”

But what he can’t do is sell cocaine to the public, which is the kind of distinction potential investors may want to be aware of before they inhale the hype.

• Email: joconnor@nationalpost.com | Twitter: oconnorwrites

Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) -- A delegation from Mongolia these days is conducting active negotiations on cooperation with representatives of Uzbekistan. It is planned to open an embassy of Mongolia in our country. As part of the visit, the Mongolian delegation headed by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Mongolia Batmunkh Battsetseg met today with the Minister of Agriculture of Uzbekistan Aziz Voitov. The parties discussed issues of cooperation in the field of agriculture between the two countries.

Mongolia considers Uzbekistan as an important country for expanding its economic and trade presence in the Central Asian region. It is worth noting that in 2022 the trade turnover of agricultural and food products with Mongolia amounted to US$5.5 million. At the talks, the parties expressed their readiness to cooperate and strengthen relations in the field of agriculture. So, we decided to establish the export of meat, meat products and leather, as well as to strengthen the exchange of experience on the development of intensive orchards and greenhouses. The parties also reached an agreement to hold the 1st meeting of the Uzbek-Mongolian Intergovernmental Commission in the first half of 2023 in Tashkent.

Batmunkh Battsetseg, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Mongolia:

- Diplomatic relations between Uzbekistan and Mongolia are already more than ten years old, and we believe that the potential for cooperation between our states should be strengthened. The political position of Mongolia is to build pragmatic relations with the countries of Central Asia, especially with Uzbekistan. Our countries do not have access to the oceans, the Mongolian side is interested in the geographical position of Uzbekistan as a transit hub. For our part, we propose to pay attention to meat products, leather products and their export to Uzbekistan. Also, since last year, quarantine zones have been operating in our country, where the necessary conditions for processing and storing products have been created. We would like to cooperate with Uzbekistan on food security issues as well. Establishing relations between Uzbekistan and Mongolia is going in a positive way.

As you know, there are already agreements on opening a Mongolian embassy in Tashkent. We hope that the issues of direct flights between our countries will soon be resolved, which, of course, will have a beneficial effect on the development of tourism, as well as on the establishment of our trade and economic relations.

Uzbekistan also attaches particular importance to strengthening and building up practical mutually beneficial cooperation with Mongolia. In his speech, the Minister of Agriculture of Uzbekistan Aziz Voitov noted:

— I think that we need to identify complementary sectors in science and technology. For example, the Uzbek side is ready to share its experience in creating intensive gardens and greenhouses, and is also interested in the experience of Mongolia in animal husbandry and veterinary medicine. We also give preference to the import of halal-labeled meat products. Mongolia has a stable demand for fruits and vegetables from Uzbekistan. In addition, the Uzbek side is ready to supply nuts, confectionery, alcohol and tobacco products. We believe that we should also draw up a list of enterprises interested in mutual supplies, as well as establish direct contacts between them. It is impossible to ignore the opening prospects in the tourism industry. Creating the image of Mongolia in Uzbekistan requires us to organize events for the tourism sector of both countries.

Aziz Voitov also said that on 16-18 March 2023, a working group from Uzbekistan will be sent to Mongolia, which will include entrepreneurs. They will be able to work out the issues of supply and cooperation with Mongolian producers on the spot, as well as consider the possibility of implementing joint projects in the field of animal husbandry. During the visit, the delegation will be able to assess the potential for joint breeding of livestock in Mongolia with subsequent export to Uzbekistan for processing at meat processing plants.

Tileukhany Aubakir, Deputy of the State Great Khurali of Mongolia:

— Today we discussed the export of meat, meat products and leather. There are good export opportunities in Mongolia - up to 20 million tons of meat, and in Uzbekistan there is a great demand for meat and meat products. It is worth noting that in Mongolia there is an opportunity to produce halal meat. I believe that your country has a great potential for exports in the agricultural sector. We are ready to develop economic relations in terms of export and import between our countries.

At the end of the meeting, the parties exchanged memorable souvenirs, and also agreed that fruitful work is to be carried out in the agro-industrial sector in all areas, which will become a good basis for the upcoming meeting of the heads of state at the next SCO summit, which will be held in June this year in India.

The Embassy of the Czech Republic is pleased to announce the new signing of a contract between the Czech Development Cooperation and the Mongolian Association of Leather Industry.

On March 9, 2023, Mr. Jan Vytopil, the Czech Ambassador, signed the contract with the Mongolian Association of Leather Industry in Ulaanbaatar. Within the framework of the contract, the company will receive financing valued at MNT 77,000,000 or the Czech technology for cleaning wastewater from the wool processing industry.

A new wastewater treatment station will enable the Mongolian Association of Leather Industry to improve its environmental protection efforts and increase the efficiency of its wool processing operations. It represents a significant step forward in Czechia’s commitment to sustainable development and international cooperation.

The Czech contribution to Mongolia's leather processing industry dates back to the days of Czechoslovakia when a chevron factory was built and handed over to Mongolia between 1958 and 1960. A leather factory was established in 1975-1980, and a shoe factory with 3,500 employees was put into operation in 1979-1981. Within the framework of development cooperation, in 2007-2010, the leather factory modernization project of MLTJ LLC was implemented, and as part of the same cooperation, environmental pollution research at the Khargia treatment plant was conducted in 2010-2012, and recommendations were provided for further measures.

South Korea’s convenience store brand opened its 300th store in Mongolia since it entered the market five years ago, while it aims to operate 500 stores by June, up from the current 430.

According to BGF Retail Co., the operator of CU convenience stores, on Thursday, the latest store it opened in Mongolia is located inside a luxury apartment complex in the capital city Ulaanbaatar. The opening of the new Gerlug Vista store has made CU to become the country’s first retailer to operate 300 stores in a single overseas country.

BGF Retail plans to manage 500 CU stores overseas by June this year, up from the current 430 stores that include 130 in Malaysia.

The retailer said that the Gerlug Vista store offers 40 percent more differentiated products such as a diverse range of desserts and private labels than other stores in Mongolia given that many young consumers live in the building.

CU has been expanding its presence in Mongolia. It recently opened three stores in Darkhan, the country’s second-largest city, for the first time as a convenience store brand.

It took 26 months for BGF Retail to open 100 CU stores in Mongolia after its entry in 2018, 18 months to operate 200 stores, and only 10 months to manage 300 stores.

Sales of CU stores in Mongolia have soared 48 percent last year from a year ago. About 1,000 consumers visit each store in Mongolia every day, which is triple that of Korea.

The popularity of CU stores in Mongolia is in line with the high attention given to Korean food thanks to Korean contents such as music and drama. About 30 percent of the products sold at the stores are of the HEYROO private label.

One of the most popular items is the instant “GET” coffee. Each store sells about 200 cups every day, which is more than 10 times those sold in Korea.

Sales of simple prepared meals, such as bulgogi, or marinated beef, gimbap, or seaweed rolls, climbed 24.2 percent last year from a year ago. Sales of ready-to-eat food, like tteokbokki, or rice cake in spicy sauce, rose 117.4 percent during the same period.

By Noh Hyun and Han Yubin

According to the National Statistics Office of Mongolia, by the preliminary results of January, the gross industrial output reached MNT 2.7 trillion, which increased by MNT 1.4 trillion (2.2 times more) from the previous year.

This increase was mainly due to the mining and quarrying production output increase by MNT 1.3 trillion (2.8 times more) and the manufacturing production output by 62.3 billion (19.0%), respectively. The mining and quarrying gross output reached MNT 2.0 trillion, which increased by MNT 1.3 trillion (2.8 times more) from the previous year. This increase was mainly due to increases in coal and lignite mining by MNT 1.1 trillion ( 8.9 times more) and mining of metal ores by MNT 117.3 billion (20.4%) from the previous year.

In the manufacturing sector, pure water, soft drink, juice, metal steel, wheat flour, and meat increased by 0.7 percent to 2.4 times more than the previous year. In the manufacturing sector, production of cigarettes, milk, alcoholic beverage, copper cathode (99%), spirit, lime, cashmere products, coal briquette, combed cashmere, face covering, and sanitizer decreased by 0.1-96.5 percent compared to the previous year.

The sales of industrial products reached MNT 3.3 trillion, which increased by MNT 1.8 trillion (2.2 times more) compared to the previous year. This increase mainly resulted from sales of mining and quarrying products growing by MNT 1.7 trillion (2.8 times more) and sales of electricity, gas, steam, and air conditioning supply products by MNT 49 billion (32.3%).

The sales of mining and quarrying products increased by MNT 1.7 trillion (2.8 times more) compared to the previous year. This increase mainly resulted from MNT 1.4 trillion (10.2 times more) increase in sales of mining of coal and lignite.

According to the preliminary results of January, the total sales of industrial products, MNT 2.5 trillion was exported, of which 2.4 trillion was exported of mining and quarrying products. The mining and quarrying products structure shows that 57.9 percent was coal and lignite, 37.1 percent was metal ores, 4.3 percent was the extraction of crude petroleum, and 0.7 percent was other mining. In January 2023, the seasonally adjusted industrial production index was 237.3 (2015=100), showing an increase of 29.7 percentage points compared to the same period of the previous year.

China Railways and the Kazakhstan equivalent, the Kazakh Temir Zholy have had their first meeting to coordinate transport since the outbreak of Covid-19. Taking place in Beijing last week, an upward trend in cargo transport between the two countries was noted, reaching a record high of over 23 million tons in 2022, 15% more than the previous year.

Discussions involved the current state of and prospects for cooperation on development of international transport corridors through Kazakhstan. Special attention was placed on exports from China to other markets.

The meeting also focused on the modernization of Dostyk-Maiynty railway section, being a port of entry (by highway and railroad) to and from China. This rail section serves as an important link in the Eurasian Land Bridge, and is situated in the Dzungarian Gate, a historically significant mountain pass and is across the border from Alashankou in China’s Xinjiang Province.

Discussions also featured the planned construction of a third railway border crossing on the Bakhty- Tacheng section, further north and closer to the Mongolian border.

Other important meetings have also recently taken place concerning rail transit to Europe, during which a memorandum was signed between Kazpost (an authorised Kazakh operator) WEA-Transport GmbH (from Germany, an authorised operator of the European Union) and Huapengfei Company of China (authorised operator in the PRC). This is designed to carry out cross-border trade in the Eurasian space and organise an international logistics corridor for e-commerce.

This is the first memorandum of trilateral cooperation between the authorised economic operators of Kazakhstan, China and the EU for mutually beneficial foreign economic activity. The memorandum was signed in order to develop an international logistics platform and share a secure supply chain of goods. The agreement opens up the opportunity to carry out electronic commerce on transport flows from China to the EU countries through Kazakhstan, it is also focused on promoting and supporting cross-border trade in the Eurasian space, in particular, such projects as the Belt & Road Initiative, and the Western Europe – Western China routes.

This contained proposals as concerns customs procedure and administration, as when using special customs simplifications, the time and financial costs of customs declaration of goods are minimized, the logistics chain is optimised, and downtime is reduced.

Asel Zhanasova, Chairman of the Board of Kazpost, said that “The status of the Authorised Economic Operator of Kazakhstan makes it possible to use the simplification of customs clearance and inspection. We expect that the signing of the memorandum and cooperation with such large companies will allow us to play a key role in the field of cargo transportation and transit through Kazakhstan.”

Meanwhile, Kazakhstan’s efforts to promote the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TITR) enabled the country to halve the cargo transit time from 12 to 6 days, according to Prime Minister Alikhan Smailov, who made the statement on March 2 at a transport meeting in Almaty. That six day timeframe is expected to be reduced to five days by the end of 2023.

He also said that thanks to the work conducted by the TITR participating countries to eliminate bottlenecks on the route and introduce tariffs and other measures, the delivery time of goods from China to the Black Sea ports in Georgia has decreased from 38-53 to 19-23 days. By the end of 2023, that is expected to be shortened to 14-18 days.

The Kazakh government have also discussed measures to modernize the country’s railway infrastructure, upgrade the rolling stock fleet, and expand the merchant fleet and the capacities of the Aktau and Kuryk seaports in Western Kazakhstan on the Caspian Sea. Ten oil barges, eight ferries, six tankers, and a container ship, all of them procured by Kazakhstan, are expected to start operating in the Caspian Sea by 2030.

Smailov also urged the acceleration of the approval procedures of an agreement between Kazakhstan and China on the TITR development, which is to simplify customs procedures and approve guaranteed traffic volumes on the route.

Sources: The Astana Times and Kapital

Ulaanbaatar -- Harnessing the power of technology and innovation for the voice and the political, social, and economic empowerment of women and girls in Mongolia is essential to deliver transformative impact and achieve the Sustainable Development Goals in Mongolia.

However, the inclusion of women and girls and their safety in the digital space must be prioritized to ensure that the benefits of digital transformation are enjoyed by all equally.

This year’s International Women’s Day sheds a spotlight on the potential of innovation and technology in reducing inequalities and closing gender gaps.

While advancements in digitalization are transforming economies, industries, and societies, women and girls are often being left behind, or worse, harmed by them.

Though Mongolia is making steady progress toward advancing gender equality, the road ahead to full realization of gender equality remains long and arduous. Current global and local crises, including health emergencies, climate change, food insecurity, and cost-of-living crises, are exacerbating the existing inequalities and deeply impacting Mongolia’s most vulnerable, including female-headed households and rural women. Information and communication technologies (ICT) are essential and can play an instrumental role in strengthening their resilience.

Women and girls in Mongolia continue to face widespread discrimination and violence offline and online, unequal access to technology, finance, healthcare, employment, salary and compensation, and decision-making. Cultural and social norms that reinforce gender stereotypes, significantly threaten women’s participation in digital and public spaces and leave tremendous, often irreversible harm on the mental health, well-being, and safety of women and girls.

There is a substantial divide when it comes to education and employment in the ICT sector in Mongolia. For instance, male students comprise 73 percent of graduates in information technology of total university graduates as of 2022.

We must address these issues with a multi-faceted and concerted approach by challenging harmful gender norms and developing an enabling environment that ensures women and girls have equal access to technology, skills, employment, and opportunities to fully participate in the digital economy.

We call on all Mongolian men and women, boys and girls to join the UN in Mongolia in realizing our common vision for an inclusive, sustainable, and prosperous Mongolia where:

a girl grows and thrives in a safe and healthy environment without any forms of violence, neglect, or exploitation, and pursues any career, including one in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM), should she choose to do so;

a professional woman gets compensated fairly and equally according to her skills, not by her gender;

a woman entrepreneur trades at a high level and on improved terms benefiting from the digital economy;

a migrant woman enjoys decent socioeconomic opportunities without being left behind;

a herdswoman plays an active role in rural development;

a girl and woman feel their voices are heard, and a woman enjoys equal participation at the decision-making level at home and in public

a young woman makes her own decision regarding her health and body without being harassed;

the rights and welfare of healthcare workers (80%+ are women) are protected and supported.

We call on the Government of Mongolia and all of our partners to work together to ensure women and girls are not left behind or their safety or well-being is compromised when utilizing technology and innovation to accelerate Mongolia’s sustainable development.