Mongolia recorded 3119 new COVID-19 cases over the past 24 hours, exceeding the 3,000 mark for the first time since September 2021, bringing the national tally to 417,557.

The latest confirmed cases were all locally transmitted, and more than half of them were detected in the national capital Ulaanbaatar, the hardest-hit area by the virus and home to over half of the country’s population of 3.4 million.

Meanwhile, three more related deaths were reported in the past day, and the country’s COVID-19 death toll remains at 2,092.

Since the beginning of this year, daily COVID-19 infections have significantly increased across the country due to New Year celebrations and the Omicron variant.

The Omicron cases currently account for at least 70 percent of new daily infections in the country, said Ts.Bilegtsaikhan, director of the National Center for Communicable Diseases, urging the public to follow all relevant health guidelines.

So far, 75 percent of the total population has received two COVID-19 vaccine doses, while over million people aged over 18 have received a third dose.

In addition, 50 thousand Mongolians have received a fourth dose, which the country started to administer from 7 January on a voluntary basis.

Iron ore led gains among industrial metals Wednesday as China vows to use more monetary policy tools to spur the economy, brightening the outlook for raw materials demand.

Futures in Singapore climbed over 3% to more than $130 a tonne. Dalian iron ore jumped nearly 5%, while benchmark 62% Fe fines imported into Northern China were changing hands for $131.23 a tonne during morning trading, up 2.8% compared to Tuesday’s closing, according to Fastmarkets MB.

“Expectations of easing from the People’s Bank of China while bracing for tighter US monetary policy will spur traders to punt on rates-sensitive assets such as commodities and bonds,” Hong Hao, head of research at BOCOM International, wrote in a research note.

China, the world’s biggest buyer of metals, has been mired in a property market slump, credit stress and repeated virus outbreaks. In response, the central bank this week cut its policy interest rate for the first time in almost two years, signaling the beginning of an easing cycle.

“There’s a trend of strengthening the macro policies to stabilize the economy amid downward pressure on the real-estate market,” Huatai Futures said in a note.

Singapore iron ore price

Top steel-producing region Tangshan announced plans for winter curbs on Tuesday, Mysteel reported, citing local government documents.

According to Mysteel’s own survey, the capacity utilization rate for blast furnaces in the city will be lowered to 63% from 78% when 16 more furnaces shut from January 30 to February 20 and from March 3-13, affecting capacity of about 60,000 tonnes a day.

“The resumption of production at steel mills may have to wait until after the Lunar New Year holidays, which could have an impact on the supply of steel,” Huatai said.

At its regular meeting on January 19, the Cabinet instructed 'Mongolian Railway' state-owned shareholding company to carry out the construction work of the cross-country railways in western and eastern region under the build-transfer-operate type of concession contract, reports Minister of Road and Transport L.Khaltar.

In accordance with the Government's action program for 2020-2024 and the ‘New Revival Policy’, the resolution to intensify the construction work of the railway has been approved.

As for the railway in the western region, it will stretch 1200 km in route Artssuuri-Nariinsukhait, Shiveekhuren. The railway in the eastern region is planned to be constructed with length of 420 km in route Choibalsan-Khuut-Bichigt. The project will be realized by the 'Mongolian Railway' company in cooperation with foreign and domestic investors and mining license holders.

With the implementation of the railway projects, the total length of railroad in Mongolia will stretch 4700 km, which means that it will be extended by 2700 km.

Newly-appointed head coach of the Mongolian national football team Otsuka Ichiro arrived in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia yesterday.

Former head coach Shuichi Mase resigned and returned home in late 2021 due to health concerns.

As part of the cooperation between the Mongolian Football Federation and the Japan Football Association, Otsuka Ichiro, 57, has been selected. Thus, he will serve as the coach of the team on a one-year contract.

At the Cabinet’s regular meeting on January 19, Minister of Finance B.Javkhlan gave a progress report on the government procurements for projects and actions scheduled to begin in 2022 with state budget funding.

Bids have been announced for 140 or 19.5 percent of a total of 717 projects and actions and bids for eight projects and actions are in their final stages. Deadlines for 134 bids are not over.

Prime Minister L.Oyun-Erdene ordered general budget governors that bids should be announced for all projects by March 1.

UGIINUUR, ARKHANGAI PROVINCE, MONGOLIA — The endless prairie has become a colander, peppered with what look like golf holes. Small gray rodents dart in and out, growing more numerous as late autumn sunshine warms the Mongolian steppe in the country’s central Khangai region.

Munkh-Erdene Baasanjav, a herder for 30 years, drills a hole into a raised mound and puts his hand inside to confirm his fears: a nest of thick grass. After removing the material, he pumps 60 liters of water into the hole, an environmentally friendly method of freezing the creatures out.

“When I was a child, there were rodents in some places, but now they are bustling everywhere like dust rising,” he says.

The pests are Brandt’s voles, one of the fastest reproducing mammals in the world. Female voles can give birth three times a year, up to 11 offspring each time. Just one of these rodents, smaller than a man’s hand, can eat 34 grams (1 ounce) of grass per day and stockpile 9 kilograms (20 pounds) of hay for winter.

Rising temperatures and overgrazing in Mongolia have fueled a dramatic increase in the vole population, by making soil conditions more favorable for nesting. The infestation threatens one-third of the country’s grasslands (38.6 million hectares, or 149,000 square miles), according to the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Light Industry, leaving less food for livestock. The burrow holes also pose a hazard, leading horses and people to sprain their ankles or break bones. In response, herders and government rangers are working to reduce the vole population without harming other animals.

Enkhbold Nanj, a doctor of biological sciences at the Plant Protection Research Institute, a national organization that studies Mongolia’s grasslands and pests, says it’s normal to have 100 voles per hectare, but now some areas have up to 2,000. Estimates put their total population at over a billion.

“It’s too much,” he says. “It turns the soil over.”

Mongolia’s grasslands are state owned, while livestock are privately owned. A mainstay of the economy, the livestock sector accounts for more than 10% of the country’s gross domestic product and 23% of its labor force. Herders raise horses, cattle, sheep, goats and camels, and earn money by selling dairy products, meat and hides.

Since the country’s shift to a market economy, the number of livestock has nearly tripled, from 25 million in 1990 to nearly 70 million in 2020. The resulting overgrazing has caused soil deterioration on 78% of its grasslands, according to the Mongolian National Federation of Pasture User Group, a self-governing association of more than 80,000 members working to develop pasture management policies.

Dr. Tseveendorj Dalkhaa, head of the Rodent Research Laboratory at the Plant Protection Research Institute, says that humans must accept responsibility for disrupting the ecosystem by hunting or driving out the vole’s natural predators, such as foxes.

“If an animal exists in nature in a balanced way, it will not cause any harm,” he says. “But voles are said to be harmful when the right balance is lost.”

The average temperature in Mongolia has risen more than 2 degrees Celsius (more than 3.5 degrees Fahrenheit) since 1939. When combined with overgrazing, the resulting dry, warm soil has created a favorable environment for voles to multiply, says Munkhnasan Tsevegmed, a pasture protection and restoration specialist at the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Light Industry.

Before 2003, Enkhbold says Mongolians used pesticides to protect pastures, but these chemical methods have been discontinued due to their toxic environmental impacts.

Traditional extermination methods are far more labor-intensive. Since 2019, the government has provided a daily bonus of 2,000 Mongolian togrogs (70 cents) to herders and 20,000 togrogs ($7) to unemployed people who pour water into burrows, scatter rice contaminated with vole-killing bacteria and provide shelter for birds of prey.

These organized efforts have happened on 15% of the affected region so far, Munkhnasan says, which is not enough to overtake the vole’s reproductive success nor address the root causes of the infestation.

Enkhtur Badam-Ochir, a 41-year-old herder from Ugiinuur soum, or district, says that when she weighed a 1-year-old sheep to sell five years ago, it weighed 21 kilograms (46 pounds). Today, she says, the same sheep would not weigh more than 18 kilograms (40 pounds).

“The voles eat all the savory and nutritious grass,” Enkhtur says. “Therefore, animals do not fatten up.”

Both local and national levels of government are focused on tackling the vole problem. While province governors adjust pasture usage plans by consulting local herders and considering annual plant yields, the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Light Industry works to regulate land use and protection nationally. This includes a Law on Livestock Tax, effective July 2021, that uses revenue to fund more pest-control efforts and rehabilitate the country’s grasslands.

“The most affordable, effective and long-term measure to regulate excessive multiplication of voles is to reduce overgrazing and allow vegetation to regrow,” Munkhnasan says.

The number of livestock needs to reflect the size of the pasture, and the economic turnover of livestock should accelerate, he says. And herders should have fewer animals of better quality, rather than many animals of poor quality.

Although they recognize the problems of overgrazing, many Mongolians can’t afford to thin their herds.

“We supply all our needs with livestock, and the price of raw materials is not enough, so we don’t want to reduce the number of livestock,” says Munkhtsetseg Tudev, a resident of Ugiinuur soum. Any less livestock, she says, “is not enough to live on.”

Odonchimeg Batsukh is a Global Press Journal reporter based in Mongolia.

Representatives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Civil Aviation Authority, MIAT and the Embassy of Mongolia in the United States held an online meeting yesterday in preparation for a direct flight between Mongolia and the United States.

During the meeting, they exchanged views and information on the progress of the work and further steps to be taken.

The meeting was attended by Mongolia’s Ambassador to the U.S. U.Batbayar, Director of the Department of Americas, Middle East and Africa of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs A.Anand, Executive Director of MIAT Mongolian Airlines B.Munkhtamir, Director General of the Civil Aviation Authority S.Munkhnasan and other relevant officials.

The Ministry of Health reported that 3,088 new cases of COVID-19 have been reported in the past 24 hours. Specifically, 1,708 cases were reported in Ulaanbaatar city, with 1380 cases in rural aimags.

It was also reported that no COVID-19 related death has been reported in the past 24 hours. Currently, 8,882 people are receiving hospital treatment for COVID-19 whilst 41,854 people with mild symptoms of COVID-19 are being isolated at home.

Of the total patients currently undergoing treatment at hospitals, there are 2,862 patients in mild, 5,092 in serious, 875 in critical, and 53 in very critical conditions.

The coverage of 1st dose has reached 69.7 percent (2,268,377), 2nd dose – 66.7 percent (2,168,827) and 3rd dose or a booster shot of COVID-19 vaccines – 30.0 percent (979,390) of the total population. Moreover, 49,504 people or 2.0 percent got 4th dose of the vaccines.

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Small and landlocked, the Central Asian nation struggles to

balance its economy with essential public health measures.

Food shortages, inflation, hundreds of thousands of people without an income, and thousands of shipping containers stuck on the border, not to mention rising Covid-19 cases, job losses, closed businesses, a crippled export sector, and a decimated tourism industry: this has been the situation in Mongolia for the past two years. In an interview with the author, Deputy Prime Minister Amarsaikhan Sainbuyan described the pandemic as “the biggest crisis of my career” and went on to explain the difficulties that a small, developing democracy experiences when it tries to balance the economy while safeguarding public health.

Mongolia is a lower-middle income country with a population of only three million and a per capita annual household income of US$1,787. For almost 70 years, Mongolia was a Soviet satellite. In 1992, the Soviets left, and the country abandoned communism, transitioning to capitalism and democracy. While the living standards of most Mongolians have dramatically improved over the past ten years, Mongolia’s economic development has been erratic, with a negative 9.3 per cent GDP growth in 1992 and a positive 17.3 per cent growth in 2011. In 2018, Mongolia’s economy was improving, with 7.5 per cent growth, but in 2020, as a result of pandemic lockdowns, growth dropped to negative 4.6 per cent.

Mongolia’s mining sector accounts for 90 per cent of exports and roughly 26.1 per cent of GDP.

One of the reasons for Mongolia’s boom-and-bust trajectory is that the mining sector accounts for 90 per cent of exports and roughly 26.1 per cent of GDP. But these numbers only represent direct income from the sale of commodities. Mining money ripples through the economy, supporting businesses, education, banking, finance, construction and many other sectors. Indeed, Investment Monitor considers the nation’s economy to be 100 per cent dependent on mining and rates Mongolia as the country most vulnerable to fluctuations in commodity prices.

In January 2020, when the first coronavirus cases were reported in China, Mongolia closed the international airport, as well as its only two borders, with China and Russia. This resulted in a severe decline in Mongolia’s export income. China accounts for more than 60 per cent of Mongolia’s total trade, providing 33 per cent of its imports, while buying 89.1 per cent of its exports. Finished products began thinning out on retail store shelves, and prices started to rise. The government implemented a stringent lockdown, closing schools and non-essential businesses. With no unemployment benefits to rely on, people began to suffer.

A World Bank survey found that those living in poverty and households whose income was reduced by the pandemic were more likely to experience food insecurity. Many children, dependent on school meals, suffered vitamin and nutrition deficiencies. UNICEF found that 62.1 per cent of children lost weight, while 20 per cent experienced decreased frequency of meals.

Mongolia relies on China for more than 60 per cent of its total trade (Nick Farnhill/Flickr)

The World Bank also estimated that as many as 260,000 more Mongolians had slipped into poverty in 2020, increasing the poverty rate to 33.6 per cent, while 35.2 per cent of households reported a decline in income.

To make matters worse, inflation skyrocketed to 9..6 per cent, with the prices of food, solid fuels and gasoline increasing the most. Ten months into the pandemic, meat prices in Ulaanbaatar had risen 16 per cent and fuel prices 38.8 per cent.

Deputy Prime Minister Amarsaikhan explained that the government was doing its best to follow the guidance of the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and World Health Organisation, but “Covid measures drained our budget”. With very little revenue, he said, “We had to depend on international donors, our neighbours, embassies and diplomatic missions.” Donations of medicine and equipment came from around the world, but it cost money to outfit ambulances with oxygen machines and to get the supplies to doctors in remote regions of the country. The cost of Covid relief measures increased the 2020 budget deficit to 9..5 per cent of GDP.

While Mongolia is ready to get back to work, China maintains a zero Covid policy, which keeps the borders closed, Mongolia’s exports low, and domestic consumer prices high.

About half of the population lives in the capital city of Ulaanbaatar, while between 30 and 40 per cent are nomadic herders. Across the entire country, the population density is only two people per square kilometre. “We had to bring these new ventilators, beds, pumps, new medicines…and we had to deliver it,” said Amarsaikhan. “In the rural areas, the countryside, in 21 provinces, there were almost no oxygen facilities, so in the past two or three months we had to import, transport and install oxygen facilities in 16 provinces.”

Since April 2021, things have improved a great deal. Private sector businesses have been reopening and people have been returning to employment in many sectors. Production and sales volumes have remained lower than pre-pandemic levels, as have incomes, but the deputy prime minister vows that the government has no plan to lock down the country again.

So while Mongolia is ready to get back to work, China maintains a zero Covid policy, which keeps the borders closed, Mongolia’s exports low, and domestic consumer prices high. National Statistical Office division head, Tseveenjav Lkhanaa, sums up Mongolia’s precarious economic situation as “disproportionally dependent on our biggest foreign trade partner, China.” Ultimately, Mongolia is hostage to China’s zero Covid mandate and the country’s recovery lies almost exclusively in the hands of Beijing and its border control policies.