Field Visit in Mongolia: Conserving Grasslands to Protect People and Nature

Mongolia’s grasslands can seem like an idyll from an earlier age: sweeping plains cut by fish-filled rivers and dotted with the yurts of nomadic herders and rare species of antelope, wild horse and camel. But the vast steppes and other ecosystems in the landlocked Asian country are under growing pressure from threats including climate change and overgrazing, endangering both traditional livelihoods and biodiversity.

Senior Programme Manager Nina Saalismaa travelled to Mongolia in September to see how The Nature Conservancy (TNC), a key recipient of Foundation support, and the government are working to protect nature and make its use more sustainable.

What was the main purpose of the field visit?

We recently entered into an exciting new multi-year partnership with TNC in Mongolia, so I wanted to get a first-hand perspective on the challenges and opportunities facing the country and its rural communities.

I travelled with senior members of TNC’s global and country teams who were able to explain in detail how the organisation is already working to advance conservation and climate change adaptation on the ground.

So I got a baseline view of the country at the outset of the partnership and a feel for the team that we will be working with in the years to come.

Why is this new partnership important for the Foundation?

TNC is working with the government, partners and communities on a programme called Eternal Mongolia. The programme is designed to ensure that policies to meet the government’s ambitious conservation goals and secure its environment and natural resources for future generations are implemented and sustainably funded.

Our support to TNC on this programme is an opportunity to further conservation and sustainable, climate-adapted livelihoods together at a large scale. These are core goals of the Foundation’s new strategy.

With strong partners, government commitment and a framework for collaborative action, many of the ingredients are in place for this programme to have real and lasting benefits.

Working meeting with senior members of TNC’s global and country teams.

Mongolia has more than 60 million head of livestock, which experts say is unsustainable. What can be done to reduce the pressure on the land?

My first stop was Delgerkhaan, a district about 5 hours by car from the capital. TNC has helped a community-based organisation to establish a tannery there to prepare sheep skins. This is one way to add value in the livestock sector.

They are also encouraging the community to cooperate in areas like collectively managing their land, marketing their produce, and producing hay to feed their animals in winter.

If people earn more from their animals, they are less dependent on maintaining big herds. That makes it easier to implement grazing schemes that can halt or reverse degradation of the grasslands and are adapted to the changing climate.

Strengthening rural incomes also makes these communities more resilient to increasingly frequent climate-related disasters, such as droughts and storms, and the extremely cold winters known in Mongolia as “dzud”, which can kill millions of animals in a season.

I spoke with the local governor and attended a meeting of the community-based organisation where people described how they had suffered two harsh winters in a row, and that there had been heavy unseasonal rains just before my visit. They are very aware of the climate threat and our partners are helping them to find solutions.

Visiting a community-managed tannery in Delgerkhaan, where TNC supports efforts to add value to livestock and promote sustainable land management to protect grasslands.

TNC is advising an independent trust fund that will receive support from the Foundation and whose goals include boosting the development of ecotourism in Mongolia. How important is that income stream for the partnership’s goals?

I spent several days on the spectacular Onon River, travelling by boat and staying in teepees and yurts supplied by a tour operator. These are amazing, wild landscapes with rich biodiversity and huge potential for more tourism, such as sustainable fishing for taimen, a kind of salmon, and visiting protected areas like the Onon-Balj National Park.

Done well, sustainable tourism can breathe new life into these rural communities and reward them for being great custodians of their natural and cultural heritage. It can create jobs for young people who would otherwise move to the city. International visitors need information, accommodation, amenities, guides and many other services – and they are willing to pay good prices for it.

TNC is already supporting hundreds of community-based organisations, several of whom I was able to meet with, either in the field or in the capital. These established partners will be invaluable in the effort to accelerate climate-resilient rural development under the Eternal Mongolia programme.

What feeling did you come away with?

Hope, because of the country’s magnificent natural resources and beauty, the commitment to sustainable development at the national level, and the human capacities on the ground.

Mongolia was one of the first countries to set the target of protecting 30 percent of its land by 2030 – a goal since embraced by the rest of the world. Now it is embarking on the Eternal Mongolia initiative, whose 15-year timeframe creates the space for good planning and adaptive management.

Just as importantly: at all of my stops, I found people who were very hospitable to outsiders, extremely knowledgeable about their environment, and who were capable and resilient – all good ingredients in communities grappling with how to adapt to new challenges.

So, this can be Mongolia’s moment to shine, and we are pleased to be making a contribution to unlocking its potential.

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