Mongolia’s National Report on
sustainable development achievements since the Rio summit of 1992
Introduction
This report illustrates the progress,
achievements and obstacles in the implementation of sustainable development
challenges pursued by the Rio summit, United Nations Conference on Environment
and Development, 1992.
The report is
prepared according to the Earth council guidelines for NCSD Rio+10 Assessment.
National strategy or planning
process for sustainable development.
The Mongolian
Government created a National Council for Sustainable Development (NCSD) chaired
by the Prime Minister in April 1996 by Government Resolution to oversee the
development and implementation of Mongolia's sustainable development strategies.
NCSD's mission is to pursue sustainable development efforts in Mongolia and to
provide overall guidance on MAP 21. NCSD of Mongolia was given a clear mandate
by the Government Resolution No.73 from April 12, 1996 to coordinate and provide
overall guidance on MAP21 development process and its implementation.
The NCSD
advises the Chair of the State Great Khural (Parliament Speaker) and the
President of Mongolia on sustainable development policy and strategy, on the
next steps in building the new management system related to the sustainable
development and on policies that foster Mongolian participation in regional and
Earth sustainable development process.
Mongolian
government adopted "Mongolian Action Programme for the 21st century" by its
resolution No. 82 of May 26, 1998. It declared that ". . . We have made a
step forward to address common global economic, social and environmental
challenges and challenges that are being faced by our country through joint
efforts with the international community. The document not only contains dreams
of our people and is an assertion of the social consensus but also lays a
development path that ought to be followed by the Government regardless of
changes that take place in the society . . . ". Main focus of the document,
covering the period between 2000-2020, was given to ways of establishing an
appropriate harmony between complex economic, social and environmental
processes. MAP-21 pinpoints economic growth, social equality and sustainability
and adequate use of natural resources as the key strategy for development. In
summary, the 21st century strategy of Mongolia was identified as follows:
• ” Overcome
poverty in the near 10 to 15 years considering it to be a threat to the
Nation’s existence.
• Combat
environmental degradation and unfavorable changes such as desertification,
scarcity of forest and water resources
• Develop
economic, educational, cultural, informational and social security framework
capable to guarantee human development and quality of life.
• Prevent
environmental global degradation and widespread disasters and overcome their
consequences with joint community efforts by establishing a reliable structure
for mutually beneficial co-operation with international community and countries
of the region and making Mongolia as a hearth of the regional development and
stability.
Thus, MAP 21 has a very broad development
objective: “To establish a process of national development that will incorporate
the principles of sustainability while meeting basic human needs.”
For years, many
have pursued the term sustainable development even before the MAP 21 conceived
and these were initial attempts on harmonizing efforts towards this development
paradigm. A new Constitution embracing democracy and the market system was
passed in May 1991 and adopted by the Parliament in January 1992, changing the
nation to a republic with parliamentary government and a directly elected
president. Hence the Constitution makes Mongolia a democratic parliamentary
state with independent legislative, executive, judicial branches; guarantees
citizens freedom of speech, religion, and other basic human rights, as well as
the right to own property, and engage in private business activity. Most
importantly, the Constitution affirmed the right of Mongolians to live in a safe
and healthy environment.
All 21 aimags
(or provinces) and the capital city, Ulaanbaatar, have now developed their
action programmes (AAPs), development programmes that incorporate environmental
concerns, social priorities, and economic objectives, as their vision for the
next century. These programmes were developed to ensure that concerns of local
people are reflected in national sustainable development policies. As a result,
the MAP 21 was elaborated incorporating AAPs , local Agenda 21s, with financial
support of UNDP's Capacity 21 and its implementation began since 1998.
In his foreword
to the MAP-21 document, the President of Mongolia N.Bagabandi appreciated it as
a document that can serve as a national guideline which embraces and defines the
whole complexity of the requirements, policy goals, working directions and
methods for developing all the spheres of our country’s life while maintaining
environmental checks and balances.
Strengths and weakness in implementation of the national
strategy or planning process
Organization
and management system:
Headed by the
Prime Minister of Mongolia the National Council for Sustainable Development is
comprised of different multistakeholders such as government, non-governmental
representatives, NGOs and private sector. Appointed as deputy chairman of the
National Council, Chairman of the Parliament Standing Committee on Environment
and Rural Policy and Minister for Trade and Industry, make a good mechanism or
opportunity to reflect and focus on regional sustainable balanced development
and clean and cleaner production issues, coordinate them supporting proper use
and protection of natural resources. Representatives of the Ministries of
Finance and Economics, Environment, Health, Social Welfare and Labour,
Agriculture, Infrastructure, Justice and Foreign Relations, a number of local
governors, NGOs, research institutions and private sectors are the members of
the Council.
After
completion of MAP21 and AAPs development, the NCSD has shifted its focus to
promoting implementation of this strategy through national and international
partners - supporters for appropriate MAP 21 demonstration projects including
curriculum reform, developing monitoring actions plan and helping aimags to find
applicable support and information for the implementation of their AAPs.
The
National
Council is responsible for developing and implementing Mongolia’s sustainable
development concept and has rights and obligations in connection with
implementation of MAP-21. It is also responsible
with
coordination and organization of work of ministries, agencies, aimag and capital
administrations, other state organizations and NGOs on implementation of MAP-21.
As the council composes of high rank position or authority it grants a good
foundations for facilitating and promoting cross-sectoral integration to a great
extent. Although it’s composition is multi-stakeholder supportive that involves
different sector and levels, as well as rrepresentatives from NGOs and private
sector a number of stakeholders consider that representatives of the government,
relevant interest groups and private sector’s involvement is still not
sufficient enough to provide efficient implementation of the programme.
The NCSD has
local branches in aimags and capital city called Economic, social and
environmental committees. The Council’s local committees are headed by governors
of aimag and the capital city who report their work to the National Council on
quarterly
basis.
In the future,
there is a need for further incorporation of NGOs, private sector, academics and
government officials in the activities of the NCSD at both national and local
levels. There is also need to extend multi-stakeholder participation in
implementation of NCSD decisions not only incorporating NGOs, private sector and
academicians, but also involving different level stakeholders.
Monitoring
mechanism for the implementation of MAP-21 and global Agenda-21 has not been
clearly determined yet. In other words, means of measurement and indicators to
monitor the progress of MAP-21 and its implementation have not been defined at
the national as well as at the local level.
Institutional capacity:
A number of
qualified professional staff in Mongolia has been increased during the last 50
years, and re-training and re-qualification of the staff in the western and
developed countries have extensively taken place in the last decade. Human
capabilities at the ministerial level are being improved as the training,
workshops and seminars organized domestically and internationally contributed to
a certain extent. However, insufficiency of the human resources in social,
economic and environmental sectors is still felt. It is often that government
employees (even some decision-makers) both at the central and local levels limit
themselves to their only responsibilities (even some do not satisfy the
requirements) and lack creativity and responsiveness to the challenges of
sustainability.
Improvement of
capabilities for self-evaluation and personal responsibilities of the staff will
be an asset in implementation of MAP-21 as well as understanding its strategic
importance and applying it to the policies and decisions.
Inadequate
practice of cross-sectoral integration or inter institutional cooperation is
generally observed despite the efforts imposed by the NCSD. Professionals tend
to pay attention to their own disciplines and ignore other factors and issues
outside their disciplines, which is likely to lead to disintegrated development
output.
Mongolian
government is putting high value into the sustainable development path.
Recently, the Prime Minister of Mongolia stressed commitment of the ruling party
to sustainable development: “Our party will pursue independent, open,
multilateral foreign policy which is based on principles and guidelines of
National Security and Foreign Policy Concepts adopted to new conditions,
national interests and taking account of the goal of sustainable development.
. . . Our party
believes that developing agriculture, industry, infrastructure, mining and
tourism sectors according to the sustainable development concept adopted by the
whole world in this century requires combining traditions of protecting the
environment and enriching the resources together with the goal of economic
development”.
As the NCSD
constitutes of mainly high rank posts, namely deputy ministers and state
secretaries, it is often prone to the risk that every time the Government is
changed
the composition of the Council converts to the new members. These changes of
NCSD lead to a loss of a valuable time span that one can not easily regain.
Resourcing:
It was
extremely important that civil society participation in the sustainable
development process had been mobilized around the formulation of national and
local Agendas 21. This process carved the knowledge among the general public,
local and central government officials, which will certainly contribute to the
effective implementation of the programme.
Nonetheless,
education level of the professional institutions doesn’t match to the world’s
level, in fact, and hence there is a need to pay closer attention to quality of
education provided that highly qualified and capable
professional/expert/specialists are the crucial factor to the country’s
strategic development.
A
traditional nomadic civilization, which evolved over centuries in Mongolia, is
based on proper balance between man and nature.
To ensure Mongolia’s competitiveness in the era of globalization, it is
necessary to develop science and technology, paying particular attention to the
introduction of environmentally sound, cleaner technologies.
The most
serious obstacle in the implementation of sustainable development activities is
the lack of domestic financial sources. Nevertheless, Government of Mongolia
identified 11 priority issues, including implementing environmental policy aimed
at providing sustainable development and ecological balance by harmonizing with
regional socio-economic development. This priority is the one of four components
of Good Governance for Human security programme, which is to deal with the
priorities set forward by the government of Mongolia.
Comparing the
size of financial resources allocated for the implementation of MAP-21 to the
size of the state budget, allocated funds would seem to be sufficient, but in a
condition of poorly developed infrastructure and sparsely living population in
the vast territory it is still not sufficient enough. Due to the worldwide
environmental deterioration, global warming, lack of water resources and
frequent and intensified natural disasters, the main sources of economic
development, especially outputs of agriculture and animal husbandry is
decreasing. This in turn affects food supply and food security of the country
and, moreover, contributes to the increase in the number of poor, unemployed and
unsecured.
Political support:
Main political
parties are well informed the issue as the NCSD focused its awareness activities
during the development of Election programmes of the parties. Many political
parties involved the issue into their Election programmes and that in turn
helped to raise public awareness on sustainable development concept as a complex
issue pursued by the Rio summit. Mr. N. Enkhbayar, the head of the ruling party,
Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party which came to the power in 2000, and
Prime Minister of Mongolia, had expressed the party’s willingness to pursue
sustainable development. Aside there is not
much
sign of support or hindrance from the opposition parties in the programme’s
implementation.
The main
leaders of the major political parties are reasonably informed on MAP-21, as
they were personally involved in one of the processes of elaboration, approval
and implementation of MAP-21 and, therefore, MAP-21 was an integral part in the
pre-election campaign carried out by the parties in the year 2000. For
example, Mongolian Social Democratic Party, which co- held political power with
National Democratic Party during 1996-2000, had titled its programme as
“Sustainable development, balanced state”.
In general, it
is praiseworthy that the President, Parliament and Government of Mongolia were
all able to find a compromise in accepting and recognizing the concept and
dimensions of sustainable development.
Legislative support:
Favorable legal conditions are created for
implementation of MAP-21 in Mongolia. As mentioned earlier that the Constitution
of Mongolia ratified in 1992, implies ideas of sustainable development, and
notions of provision of relation between nature and human, and economic
development by means of decentralization or stipulation of local independence
was immersed in it.
Environmental
laws were adopted in conformity with the Constitution, creating a legal basis
for the protection of species and ecosystems.
In line with principles of
Agenda-21, more than twenty new environmental laws have been enacted and action
plans have been established in the past few years. Numerous Mongolian
environmental laws that have been adopted by the Parliament range from laws on
special protected areas, natural plants and hunting to those on mineral
resources, toxic chemicals, and hazardous wastes. Other laws that incorporate
environmental issues have been passed, such as laws on taxation, human health,
and tourism.
Policy
documents such as State Policy on Ecology /1997/, State Population Policy /1996/
and Regional Development Concept /2001/ ratified by the Parliament of Mongolia
are closely related to MAP21 and Global Agenda21.
Although the
good legislative or regulatory framework is set up for pursuing sustainability,
it is true that its poor execution leads to not intensive and effective
implementation of MAP21.
Impact of the national
strategy
The
national strategy is now been used as a basis for formulation of policies and
programmes. For instance, the government regarded the diminishing the imbalances
of socio- economic territorial development as the important precondition towards
sustainable
development path. Thus, the MAP21 played an
important role in formulating Regional Development concept, which serves a
principal base of directions and actions for creating public policy and
regulatory system oriented to support local or regional development.
As the concept
was approved by the Parliament of Mongolia, it further recommended the
Government to allocate the necessary financial sources from the national budget
by its decree No. 57, 14 June of 2001.
Apart
from this, within the frame of Government priority – to implement environmental
policy aimed at providing sustainable development and ecological balance by
harmonizing with regional socio-economic development financial – it is planned
to allocate 4.1 billion MN¥
for the year 2001-2004.
MAP21 is
reflected in the policies and decisions made at the central and local levels,
but there are shortcomings considering a full reflection and a concrete
implementation of MAP-21. As Parliament members /MPs/ are elected for the 4
year period, newly elected MPs lack basic knowledge of MAP-21 and, therefore, it
takes time for them to understand the significance of the issue, hence it is
inadequately reflected in the decision making process in terms of relevant
span.
State budget,
as a whole, approved by the Parliament on a quarterly basis could be regarded
as a pursuit towards sustainability. Nevertheless, changes are necessary in
order to pertain proper use of funds and distribution of the budget.
As each Aimag’s
Programme was developed according to its own particularities, resources and
possibilities, it is the provision of basic conditions for decentralization.
The commitment
to decentralization has been wide and strong at all levels of government. This
appears in the form of: 1) substantial constitutional and other legal reforms
2) down-sizing in public sector staff and budgets, especially central
government. The legislative framework offers greater scope for a delegation of
power to lower authorities than in is practices so far. Thus much of the effects
of the legislative reforms have been more on paper, than real (Human Development
Report, 1997). In a study of 6 aimags it was observed that more than 60 percent
of the functions carried out by local public service organizations are assigned
by laws adopted by the State Ikh Hural (the Parliament), 30 per cent by
government resolutions and ministerial decrees, and only 10 per cent by
decisions made at the local level (Report of UNDP Mongolia Project).
The next
steps to improve the national strategy (or planning process) and its
implementation
The national strategy or the
MAP21 serves as a pull of the country’s numerous initiatives. The process of
implementation of the strategy of sustainable development needs a constant
monitoring. Attaining the objectives detailed in the programme calls for
broad-ranging measures embracing many different sectors of society and
cooperation between various implementing bodies. In order to improve the
strategy, collective
multistakeholder monitoring will
have an important contributing impact. Nonetheless, with the funding by the
Capacity 21, the NCSD of Mongolia is implementing the second phase of the
project, Support for implementing the MAP21.
Within this project an objective
was set that monitoring action plans will be developed so that implementation of
MAP21 is monitored coherently on the constant base.
Therefore, it is essential to
review the programme’s concrete progress in detailed manner.
Apart from the above in order to
improve implementation of the programme the following steps need to be
undertaken:
·
Broaden
professional knowledge and raise awareness in necessity of sustainable
development
·
Political commitment to realize
sustainable development should be risen
·
Support multi – stakeholder
participation in the implementation of the programme
·
Strengthen the institutional
capacity to deal with sustainable development issues, which is responsible for
integration of sectoral issues into sustainability path and its implementation
·
Develop intersectoral
consultation and cooperation and partnership between central governmental
institutions and more local governments
·
To introduce
sustainable development indicators and items, thus changes to the law of
Statistics and law of Budget.
Specific sustainable development
targets that are achievable in the next 5-10 years are as follows:
·
to enhance planning mechanism
and approach in pursuit to reaching sustainable development
·
to reduce
poverty and deprivation of basic needs
·
strengthening capacity to
monitor and enforce environmental regulations
·
development of non-regulatory
approaches such as environmental education and awareness and economic
instruments for environmental management
Attaining the above targets
could make a significant difference in the progress
towards sustainable development
How national sustainable
development strategies, plans and programs demonstrate an integrated approach.
It was briefly mentioned earlier
that Regional Development concept is approved in 2001 by the Parliament of
Mongolia and this policy document clearly demonstrates an example of integrated
approach towards sustainability. A vision or mission of the concept is to
create a favorable condition to dismantle current unfavorable concentration of
population and production, to reduce gaps between urban and rural areas, and
unequal and not balanced development of the regions bringing closer level of
development, on the basis of rational use of land, its resources, agriculture
and livestock, raw material resource and intellectual capabilities, and thus to
foster national socio-economic development.
In order to reach this vision the
several objectives were identified within the frame of public institution,
economy, socio-culture, protection of nature, population distribution and
urbanization and international cooperation. All these objectives are equally
interrelated and their achievement will lay down the sustainable development
pattern.
The State Policy on Ecology”
/SPE/ had been developed at a time when MAP-21 was elaborated as well, this is
why the two documents are closely interrelated and interdependent. SPE reflects
a set of policy guidelines on the proper use of natural resources while
providing opportunities for social and economic development, protection and
rehabilitation of environment and production of environmentally sound
technologies.
Moreover, National Poverty
Alleviation Programme, which is now renamed as a
Household Livelihood support programme),
Programme on Empowering Women's Welfare and Population policy of Mongolia have a
clear vision of integrating economic, social and environmental dimensions of
sustainable development. Positive impacts of programmes and policy are remarked
by the national as well as international agencies.
Enabling
continued, broad based participation in sustainable development policymaking and
implementation
Hundreds of
people of various qualifications were involved in elaboration of MAP-21and AAPs,
contributing to selection and identification of the appropriate version of
interrelation between environment, economy and social development. Elaboration
of MAP-21 was completed during a relatively short period of time by organizing
seminars and conferences broadly involving various stakeholders in different
regions. This approach gave possibilities to exchange opinions and suggestions
on the concept of development and urgent issues of the strategy. Steps towards
enhancing public participation in the implementation of MAP-21 are made to some
extent.
Policy barriers to effective local Agenda 21 implementation
In implementing sustainability
challenges at the local level, there are some barriers often induced by the
center. Although there were considerable efforts in decentralization and
provision of local governance empowerment, little were practiced or translated
into actions. The state budget tend to be allocated less under the
decentralization yet local government's authority is limited to earn the gap.
For instance, in Gobi-Altai aimag, where gold mining was identified as the
leading or most important source of economic development in the Aimag, it does
not have a licensing authority to mine the gold in its territory, instead it is
given by the central authority to mostly non local entities/individuals.
Coordinating
mechanism for stakeholder participation in sustainable development planning and
implementation
Earlier it was
said that National Council for Sustainable Development of Mongolia was a core
body for urging sustainable development challenges and concepts from the very
beginning of the process. The multi-stakeholder participation in NCSD continued
to be extended during the implementation stage of MAP 21. Recent changes in NCSD
membership include representatives from NGOs and private sector as well as
representatives from line miniseries, Parliament and local governments. Since
2000, the number of members of the NCSD had been enlarged up to 28 members
consisting of the representatives of more ministries, NGOs and the private
sector. These measures were undertaken to increase and balance participation of
the Parliament, Government, NGOs and the private sector. Thus, this mechanism
guarantees almost all sector participation given the composition of the Council.
In order to
strengthen the coordinating mechanism, so that better implementation and
monitoring of the programme progress and threats, is taken place, the following
few steps are recommended. These are:
1.
To enlarge the National Council with more committed interest
groups, people and organization and different level stakeholders, especially
staff involved in the implementation process.
2.
To create a unit or division at the Ministry of Finance and
Economics responsible for day to day management of the implementation and
monitoring of the MAP21, which will work closely with the NCSD.
3.
To intensify the
NCSD activity
National critical issues and national actions taken to address the issue
Increasing
number of poor and unemployed and environmental degradation are the most urgent
issues faced by Mongolia at the current.
I. Increasing
poverty
In response to
dramatic increase of poverty the Government took an initiative to reverse the
trend and with the collaboration and support of UN agencies, multilateral
institutions and key bilateral donors it has implemented National Poverty
Alleviation Programme (NPAP) during 1996-2000. The main objective of NPAP was to
substantially reduce the level of poverty, to cut poverty to 10 per cent by the
year 2000. The programme was a wide-ranging and comprehensive attempt to
address poverty issues, not only focusing income poverty but also on social
needs of human development. By implementing the NPAP the country has gained
considerable experiences in the area of decentralization and public
participation. Significantly, it is the main accomplishment that the process of
implementation as a whole imposed a change in mentality of poor that they can
lead their lives by own effort.
Also, one of
the proud achievements of the Programme has been the creation of a national
capacity for delivering activities even to the farthest outreach of this vast
country (National Poverty Alleviation Programme: Final summary report,
1994-2000). The programme as a whole achieved beneficial impacts on the lives of
many poor and even some managed to climb out of poverty. However, it was learnt
that due to a poor targeting and selection, or inadequate supervision some
projects have failed to achieve the set goals.
As the NPAP
final report says, poverty continues to be a serious problem and this can be
explained by number of factors, such as statistics differences, economic growth,
which has been sluggish, less-broad based and less labor intensive, and
unemployment.
To continue its
fight against poverty, the Government has been developing the next programme,
National Program to Improve
Household Livelihood, on the basis
of the successes and lessons learnt, which is aiming at overall support of human
development .
Organizational
and managerial structure:
Well structured, competent institutional framework covering all aimag, district,
soum and khoroo (administrative divisions) was established supervised by
National Poverty Alleviation Committee (NPAC). Under NPAC, the Poverty
Alleviation Programme Office in the capital city, its provincial and district
units in all aimags and duuregs, and its local units in soums and khoroos work
in due course.
Institutional
capacity:
Institutionally, a nation wide capacity involving all local administrative units
(aimags, districts, soum and khoroo) to deal with poverty have been formed and
strengthened.
Resources and
funding:
Human resource necessary for all level unit working for poverty alleviation is
provided. Total of 15.6 million US$ is spent for implementation of the
programme and there is still a need to find more funding provided that poverty
has increased both in numbers of people and in the proportion of the total
population. Most of the government reports note that despite the achievements
reached through the implementation of the programme, increase of poverty is
observed during the period. This is partly because of the inadequate growth and
deterioration of the economy, which add more people to rank as poor.
Political support.
As the poverty alleviation is the major challenge in Mongolia, all the political
parties have reached a general consensus that solving the problem is the one of
the priority of the society as well as in the context of sustainability.
Legal support.
However, a legal environment on poverty alleviation is being shaped, it
nevertheless needs improvement.
II. Environmental degradation.
Most of the
territories of Mongolia are in deteriorated condition as result of climatic
changes, global warming and a various human activities. According to
researchers, over the past 60 years temperature in Mongolia has increased by
1,56 degrees, drought takes place each year and there is increase in
desiccation. Amongst environmental problems faced, land degradation and
desertification have been threatening the livelihoods of many Mongolians.
Increase in the number of livestock and its heavy concentration in localities of
water collection and in the places, where herders escape from zud (natural
disaster caused by heavy show fall), have been causing overgrazing the land and
consequently shortage of pasture.
According to the assessment of
2000-2001, 78.4 per cent of the pastureland has been degraded to a certain
extent, meaning that the size of deteriorated land has increased by 8-10 per
cent over the last decade. Sequence of repeated droughts, deterioration of
pastureland vegetation, snowstorm disaster and zud have had a negative impact on
animal husbandry.
Mongolia has
been actively participating in elaboration and implementation of the “UN
Convention to Combat Desertification” /CCD/. 3rd Asia-African Forum on the
implementation issues of the CCD”, 4th Focal Point on Coordinators of CCD of
Asian countries and a National forum on the implementation process of the CCD,
Convention on Climate Change and Convention on Biodiversity took place in the
capital city Ulaanbaatar in 2000. Mongolia was the fourth country in Asia to
formulate its National Plan of Action to Combat Desertification during 1992 and
1996. In 1994-1997 a package of laws on the Land use and management was approved
by the Parliament and are being implemented.
Legal basis to combat desertification and
degradation of lands was provided by ratification of a package of laws and
documents listed below:
- Land law /1994/
-
Law on Protected Areas /1994/
-
Law on Protection of Environment /1995/
-
Law on Land Payment /1997/
-
National Plan of Action to Combat Desertification /1996/
-
National Program on Protected areas /1998/
-
National Forestry Program /1998/
-
National Water
program /1998/
In order to
direct actions fighting degradation of land and desertification issues towards
increase in the living standards of population and reduction of unemployment,
measures supportive of hearty and proper use of the mother land are undertaken.
For example, legally it is permitted that pieces of land are given to the
ownership of herdsmen for 60 years initially, with possibilities of extension of
the right for the consecutive 40 years.
Organizational
and managerial structure. National Committee to Combat Desertification is
responsible for combating desertification. Ministries, NGOs and business groups
are members of this Committee. Although it is main accomplishment that there is
mechanism to overcome the problem, the Committee’s legal status is not adequate
to act as comprehensively and coherently as it is required.
Institutional
capacity.
Very often the activities are carried out with efforts of a limited number of
people from the Ministry of Nature and Environment interested in the
desertification issues. More inclusive working group to combat desertification
needs to be established.
Resources and
funding: There are relatively rich experiences and knowledge, based on
traditional practices and modern technologies to combat desertification.
However, activities such as analyzing the data and knowledge gathered and its
dissemination are lacking behind due to a shortage of staff working in the area
and funding and investment by national , international organizations and donors.
Political support.
All the political parties are well informed and show their interest to cooperate
in this field.
Legal support.
An adequate legal basis for combating with desertification and degradation of
land has been set up already.
Measures already taken or planned to overcome the
implementation failures
The Government’s goal towards
reducing poverty is to address the issue in line with a broad macro economic
policy aimed at sustainable economic growth, employment promotion, and
improvement of social protection. This involves amongst others:
-
Stimulation of small and medium enterprise development through an
appropriate legal and regulatory framework, a suitable tax regime, facilitation
of access to credit and entrepreneurial training
-
Investment in human capital formulation including education,
health and skills formation
The Government has started
implementing the second phase of the NPAP taking into account the experiences
and lessons of the first phase.
It is appropriate to link the
National Committee to combat desertification with the NCSD; in this way its
organization and management structure would be improved for carrying out
policies at the national level. As a matter of fact, desertification is
connected not only to degradation of land, but with poverty, deprivation and
economic depression as well. Therefore, creating a nation wide capacity to
combat desertification is of necessity.
Moreover, in order the land
degradation is arrested and to provide effective implementation of the National
Plan of Action to Combat Desertification is a raising public awareness
extensively is an urgent challenge of the society.
There are following suggestions to
solve the prioritized critical issue of combating desertification at the
national level:
-
Bring in effect the Law on Land
Payment so that imposing payment on the relevant size, productivity and quality
of the land allocated to herdsmen and landowners will provide opportunities for
restoration and protection of lands.
- Create
incentives and provide support to those entities and individuals or exempt them
from taxes or other payment, which protect or rehabilitate the land and improve
its quality by carrying out reforestation, planting trees and etc.
And at the
international level:
-As
desertification is a worldwide disaster that affects the food safety, and human
security in broad terms, there is a need to add this issue to the 4 already
existing focus of the Global Environmental Facility, such as ozone layer,
temperature increase, biodiversity and water supply.
- To annul and
reduce debts and loans of those developing countries that are spending
considerable amount for combating desertification and successful in their
undertakings.
- To conduct a
research on the implementation of the clean Development mechanism of the Kyoto
Protocol of the Climate changes.
- To propose
the European Community to cooperate and collaborate with Mongolia regarding the
implementation of the Convention to Combat Desertification.
Measures to be
taken by international organizations, the United Nations system in particular,
to support the above corrections are as follows:
- To provide
financial support to raise public awareness on combating desertification and
sustainable development .
- Allocating
funds for reforestation and settlement of wells in the Gobi and steppe zones
- Allocating
funds for the projects of National Programme on Improvement of Livelihood of
Households
- To
assist in strengthening NCSD activities, specially in terms of its empowerment
in the implementation of MAP21 and firming up its commitments to guarantee
sustainable future.
D. Global critical issue:
education, training and public awareness
How education,
training and public awareness are integrated into the country’s national
sustainable development strategy
It is stated in the MAP 21 that
As a guarantee for successful
implementation of the MAP21 the national capacity would be build up in
interrelation of planning, decision making, management, natural resources,
science, technology and human resources. The idea of building the national
capacity is to encourage in all aspects the development of a Mongolian
individual and social community, by further improving the cultural and
educational level of the people, increasing the system’s management
effectiveness at all levels, and strengthening scientific, technological,
educational, financial, and social capabilities.
Thus, education, training and
public awareness are being a part of the means of implementation of the MAP21.
The role of education, culture and
scientific organizations regarding this matter is not adequate enough concerning
the requisites. Governmental organizations, NGOs, scientific organizations lack
knowledge on these issues and, therefore, are not acting effectively.
Nonetheless,
some achievements have been made meeting the commitments of Chapter 36 of
Agenda21. National Programme on Ecological education to Public was approved by
the Government in 1997. Under the programme objectives, provisioning ecological
education has been started to deliver at the secondary school level.
In order to
increase public sensitivity to environment and development problems there was an
initiative of the environmentalists in Mongolia that established Environmental
training and Research Institute called Eco Asia. The Institute will produce
highly qualified professionals in the field of nature and environment, that will
serve disseminating information, and promoting personal environmental
responsibility and commitment towards sustainability.
Ecological
training, campaign is carried out by means of media and community initiatives
step by step.
Financial
difficulties are creating obstacles in provisioning textbooks, handouts and
training materials on environmental management. Also, there is an insufficient
qualified staff to work in this area. Public sensitivity to environment and
development problems has deteriorated during the last decades, and measures,
which mainly concentrated on formulating legislation and passing laws, are not
adequate to stay at peace. There still need more training, public campaign and
media actions that facilitate better understanding of the sustainability, sense
of personal environmental responsibility towards sustainable development among
not only public, but also at the higher level of governance - the decision
making and policy formulation level.
Ministry of
Science, Technology, Education and Culture Education has implemented the
Education sector development programme for 1997-2001, with the support of Asian
Development Bank. The programme has a comprehensive aim to strengthen education
management capabilities, improve quality and coordination in higher education in
accordance with emerging requirements and improve the effectiveness and
efficiency of secondary education. Outcome of this programme serves a basic
footing to further reorient education towards sustainable development, since it
has reformed the education sector to a great extent making sound education
management and supervision and higher education program management. It is
worthy to note that development of information system within the programme would
contribute further in disseminating information and raising public awareness.
Being part of the project, development of an academic network between major
tertiary institutions to provide communications, information and resource
sharing, inter-library cooperation and Internet access to international research
and information data bases was an important component of the reform in higher
education.
Measures planned
The NCSD of
Mongolia has been working on promoting a steady flow of high quality public
awareness messages in support of sustainable development as well as the
progressive development of revised educational curricula at primary, secondary
and tertiary levels. Thus it plans to formulate a national strategy of public
awareness and curriculum development for sustainable development by the year
2002.
In line with
the frame of Governments priority ”To implement environmental policy aimed at
providing sustainable development and ecological balance by harmonizing
protection of biodiversity with regional socio-economic development”, an
objective is set forward - Increase public participation of citizens, economic
entities, and NGOs in the environmental protection concerns, through undertaking
environmental awareness and ecological education programs. To reach this
objective, the below measures are planned for the year 2001-2004:
A.
To implement National program on environmental awareness
-
Carry out environmental awareness and training
programs every month through National TV and twice a week on radio, reach out to
the public by establishing contracts with daily newspapers, carry out regular
programs designed to improve ecological education through media channels;
-
Intensify awareness programs on traditional customs of
environmental protection and environmental legislation. Establish and operate
awareness studio in order to eliminate the violations
-
Foster the development of newspapers and journals
specialized in environmental issues.
B.
To intensify National program on Ecological education of Public:
-
Organize training courses to improve the knowledge and skills of
rangers, environmental inspectors and the personnel in charge of public
awareness affairs
-
Increase participation of Government
organizations, NGOs, economic entities and citizens in ecological educational
programs.
C.
To increase public participation in environmental protection:
-
Take measures to improve management of central and local
environmental organizations and strengthen their material resources
-
Re-establish the “Public committee to support and coordinate
people’s activities and initiatives in environmental protection; under the
direction of Minister for Environment, link its activities with committees in
aimags, broaden scope, implementing contracted projects, institute mechanism for
providing economic incentives
-
Strengthen and support environmental NGOs engaged in activities
such as reducing environmental pollution and rehabilitating degraded areas, take
measures to involve their staff in in-country and overseas training.
Moreover,
within the project carried out by the NCSD of Mongolia, it is planned that
textbooks or manuals on sustainable development for university and secondary
school students will be developed during the year 2001-2002.
In order to
improve institutional effectiveness to provide education for sustainable
development, it is necessary:
-to establish
worldwide sustainable development education network using Internet and media
-to prepare
training books, manuals, easily readable materials for general public, CDs,
video materials, special training packages for people of all ages, bring
attention and focus of scholars and researchers to the issue
-to uphold
commitment to participate in the process for intersectional consultation,
cooperation, partnership and integration in the sustainable development
initiatives and translating vision into concrete actions.
Our development vision for the 21st century is
to support human development and raise the living standards of Mongolians and
form harmonious economic, social and ecological environment for not only current
population, but maintain the society in an ecologically healthy state to future
generations.