Minister of Environment and Tourism N.Tserenbat said, “Without being disheartened by the gobi region, its water shortage and dust storms, the project team of the Greenbelt Plantation Project has worked on the restoration of 500 hectares of forest area and 1540 hectares of saxaul forest, alongside establishing a tree nursery for rare plants and a training center, through which they gave ecological knowledge to thousands of citizens and children, and provided 848 citizens in Dalanzadgad and Bayanzag soums with jobs until 2017. As the Greenbelt Plantation Project is one of the major projects being successfully implemented in Mongolia, I hope that the local authorities give more priority to the project, further strengthening the trust between the two countries.

With project financing, the Government of Mongolia established the inter-soum forest unit in Umnugobi in 2013, training them in the protection of an area of 50 hectares. The Ministry planned to allocate the forest area to forest units, professional forestry organizations, environmental NGOs, and citizens for protections.”

Comprehensive irrigation systems, infrastructure and equipment, which have total worth of MNT4.4 billion, have been installed at the forest area, training center and tree nursery. The project will also finance MNT250 million for the first year’s maintenance of 624 hectares area, which will be allocated from the state budget or local financing afterwards.

The second phase of the Greenbelt Plantation Project is to focus on developing green spaces in Ulaanbaatar, and establishing recreational green space until 2022.