Mongolia's new parliament opened its first regular session here on Thursday after June's parliamentary election to review bills and rules concerning the country's economy and society.

During the 75-day regular autumn session, legislators of the country's 76-seat unicameral parliament will discuss 112 draft laws and regulations covering many areas of the country's society and economy, said parliament speaker Gombojav Zandanshatar at the opening ceremony of the session.

Particularly, as part of the policy to reduce banks' interest rates and help more people have access to houses, the parliament is expected to consider a bill to lower the interest rate of housing mortgage loans from 8 percent to 6 percent, according to the speaker.

Housing is one of the most pressing issues in Mongolia's capital Ulan Bator, which is home to over half of Mongolia's 3.2 million population.

More than half of Ulan Bator's population live in the city's ger districts, with no running water, central heating or sewerage systems.

The ruling Mongolian People's Party won a landslide victory in the country's parliamentary elections on June 24, taking 62 seats out of 76 in the parliament.

Zandanshatar was re-elected as parliament speaker during the first session of the new parliament in June. Enditem

The number of people who recovered from coronavirus in Mongolia increased to 307 as of October 1, the National Center for Communicable Diseases said.

On September 30, two more patients were discharged from the hospital after complete recovery from COVID-19. Now they will stay in a 14-day quarantine.

Mongolia reported a total of 313 cases of coronavirus, all of them were imported.

6 patients with coronavirus stay in hospital, 4 of them have a mild form of the disease, 2 are in serious condition.

No deaths from coronavirus were reported in Mongolia.

Ulaanbaatar /MONTSAME/ According to the decision of the State Emergency Commission, a total of 82 charter flights have been conducted from January 28 to September 30, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs reports.

22,973 Mongolian nationals have repatriated from 81 countries by air and auto. In particular, 16,438 citizens arrived on charter flights while 6535 citizens entered through auto border crossings.

In addition, 30 citizens, who requested to return home from China, have been repatriated through Zamyn-Uud-Eren border crossing on September 29. Moreover, last Tuesday, September 29, a charter flight from Seoul to Ulaanbaatar brought 216 foreign citizens of 15 countries, who work in Mongolia and have permanent residence permit.

The launch of the “Building the Capacity for COVID-19 Diagnosis and Service Delivery for the Most Vulnerable in Mongolia amidst the Pandemic” project was held today. The representatives from donors, partners, and implementing organizations including Daniel Worrall, the CEO and Country Manager of Rio Tinto Mongolia LLC and Armando Torres, the CEO of Oyu Tolgoi LLC, Tapan Mishra, the UN Resident Coordinator in Mongolia and Kaori Ishikawa, the Head of Office of UNFPA Mongolia Country Office attended the launch event.

This is the first partnership between UNFPA, UN and Rio Tinto. Rio Tinto’s Country Office in Mongolia and Oyu Tolgoi LLC have granted 602,000 USD which equals to 1.7 billion MNT to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) for enhancing the capacity of health sector with a focus on COVID-19 preparedness and recovery in Mongolia. In partnership with the Ministry of Health, UNFPA Mongolia is going to utilize this fund for strengthening the country’s diagnostic capacity by building a total of four PCR laboratories in Dornogobi, Umnugobi provinces and in Ulaanbaatar, and ensuring the continuity of vital health services for persons requiring regular medical checkups by developing telemedicine services at the primary health care units.

Amarjargal Khenchbish, the Deputy Country Director for Rio Tinto Mongolia, said, “At Rio Tinto, our focus is on the health and safety of our employees and the communities where we operate and on keeping our operations running safely during the times of pandemic, so we can continue to contribute to local and national economies and serve our customers.”

Each four target hospitals including the General Hospital of Zamiin Uud soum in Dornogobi province, the Regional Diagnostic and Treatment Center of Umnugobi province, the National Center for Material and Child Health, the Ulaanbaatar City Maternal and Children’s Hospital will be equipped with PCR-based molecular diagnostic laboratories. With the PCR laboratories, the hospitals will be able to quickly diagnose not only COVID-19 but also various infectious diseases including influenza, antibiotic resistant tuberculosis, and sexually transmitted infections, as well as new and re-emerging infections at soum and provincial level, and in Ulaanbaatar.

“The continuity of essential health services is crucial at all times, especially during the health emergency like the one we are currently experiencing” noted Kaori Ishikawa, the Head of Office at the UNFPA Country Office in Mongolia at the launch. She also highlighted that “Based on UNFPA’s past experience, the telemedicine service that will be developed. It will ensure that people who require medical checkups such as pregnant women, older persons and people with disabilities receive the services they need in the comfort of their homes or at the primary health care units. It will prevent them from contracting the virus while visiting hospitals in case there is a COVID-19 outbreak in the community level and ensures that there’s no disruption in the health care services”. As part of the project, the primary health care providers will be supplied with the health provider kits and software that’s used for delivering telemedicine services. They will also be trained on communicating and receiving professional guidance with medical specialists about patients’ condition via information and telecommunication technologies.

The implementation of the project is expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2021.

The highway bridge linking Russia and China over the Amur River is expected to be operational as soon as November, according to Amur Oblast Governor Vasily Orlov. The bridge is set to boost economic ties between the two nations.

“The infrastructure and all the services are ready. We expect that the bridge will be launched in November,” Orlov said on his Instagram page this week. He explained that the opening date was postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The ambitious $300 million construction project began in December 2016 and was completed in November 2019. It was initially expected to be brought into service in April.

The bridge links the cities of Heihe in northern China and Blagoveshchensk in Russia’s Far East that are located on opposite banks of the Amur River. The structure is more than 1km long (0.6 miles) and is a part of a key 19.9km (12.4 miles) two-lane highway project.

The harsh weather conditions in the frigid region have been hampering cross-border trade for years, but the project is set to solve this problem. After the route becomes operational, cargo volume could see an 8-fold increase to four million tons per year, according to Alexander Kozlov, the Russian Minister for the Development of the Far East.

The new bridge should also boost tourism, increasing the number of visitors to Russia from China to two million. However, tourists won’t initially be able to use the road as it will only be available to cargo trucks. It will take another year and a half to build a crossing point that will enable passenger transport, including tourist buses, to cross the bridge.

Ulaanbaatar /MONTSAME/. ‘Ulaanbaatar Railways’ JSC has made the decision to use refined coal as fuel for all of the passenger train journeys from this winter.

As of today, Ulaanbaatar Railways offer passenger transport services in international and domestic routes with 282 passenger train cars. Due to the usage of raw coal for fuel to heat up the train cars in colder seasons, significant amount of air pollution used to be created in Bayangol district of the capital city due to the emission of smoke which was the equivalent of the smoke that would be omitted from the chimneys of 3,500 households in the ger district. From last winter, the railway company began to use both refined and raw coal as fuel for heating passenger trains. As for this year, the railway company has come to the decision to solely use refined coal for heating.

As it is estimated that a total of 4,400 tons of refined coal is required until May 15, 2021, the Passenger Depot of the railway company has already begun to stock the fuel.

In aims of reducing air pollution by limiting coal use, Ulaanbaatar Railways has consistently developed and implemented projects and programs on the issue. In the framework of a project being implemented in partnership with the capital city governing body, they began to install filters in passenger train stoves from last year.

Mongolia is likely to experience its first recession since 2009, according to a new report released by the World Bank on Tuesday.

The Mongolian economy is projected to contract by 2.4 percent in 2020 as weak external demand and COVID-19 containment measures hit the mining and services sectors especially hard, the World Bank said in the report titled "From Containment to Recovery: Economic Update for East Asia and the Pacific, October 2020."

However, Mongolia's economic growth is expected to accelerate to over 5 percent in 2021 and 2022, supported by private consumption and a stronger impetus on investment in the mining and manufacturing sectors, according to the bank.

The Asian country's mining-dependent economy decreased by 9.7 percent year on year in the first half of 2020 due to restrictive measures to contain the spread of COVID-19. Enditem

Ulaanbaatar /MONTSAME/. On September 29, the Asian Development Bank (ADB), Ulaanbaatar Flour Limited Liability Company (UBF), and Tavan Bogd Foods Limited Liability Company (TBF) signed a $15 million loan (in togrog equivalent) to support the wheat supply chain in Mongolia during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic.

The amount—comprised of a $10 million assistance to UBF and $5 million for TBF—will deliver liquidity support for the companies’ operations, which will help sustain the livelihoods of thousands of Mongolian wheat farmers and farm workers, in addition to the employees of UBF and TBF.

Wheat is milled to produce the country’s main staple, wheat flour. Food price hikes due to trade disruptions from containment measures would cause hardship for extremely poor households unable to afford meat and milk products. More than 25% of Mongolians are moderately or severely food insecure.

“Wheat is the primary agricultural crop in Mongolia, so reinforcing the supply chain to cope with disruptions caused by the pandemic will secure the incomes of many workers in farms, factories, and retail outlets,” said ADB Country Director for Mongolia Pavit Ramachandran. “The liquidity support to these companies will enable them to build enough buffer inventory during the pandemic, which will help avoid sharp increases in food prices.”

“We are grateful to ADB for its leadership and initiative to offer assistance in uncertain times brought about by COVID-19,” said Executive Vice President of Tavan Bogd Group Hulan Dashdavaa. “In fact, ADB was one of the first banks to reach out to the private sector in Mongolia to help address the economic impact of the pandemic. As a leader in the market, UBF is committed to continue manufacturing and consistently supplying high-quality flour to consumers throughout Mongolia. The loan will also help TBF continue to offer global standard food products and services to consumers and source more from local vendors.”

The two companies are part of the Tavan Bogd Group, one of the country’s largest diversified business groups. UBF is a leading wheat miller with 35% of the wheat flour market in 2019. TBF operates major fast-food chains and is a key player in the food delivery industry.

The loan will complement other ADB COVID-19 assistance to Mongolia, which includes a $100 million COVID-19 Pandemic Response Option, $30 million in additional financing for the Fifth Health Sector Development Program, and a $26.4 million loan to lessen the socioeconomic impacts of the pandemic through the Shock-Responsive Social Protection Project.

ADB is committed to achieving a prosperous, inclusive, resilient, and sustainable Asia and the Pacific, while sustaining its efforts to eradicate extreme poverty. Established in 1966, it is owned by 68 members—49 from the region.