The city of Ulaanbaatar has received permission from the Ministry of Finance, the Bank of Mongolia, and the Financial Regulatory Commission to issue bonds worth up to MNT 500 billion in the domestic market. Specifically, the Law on the Legal Status of the Capital City was revised and approved in 2021, and the city of Ulaanbaatar has the right to issue bonds in the financial market. In this way, Ulaanbaatar is able to follow the standards of major cities in the world and use more efficient means of financing to decide on major infrastructure investments and to work independently financially.

In the process of releasing Ulaanbaatar city bonds to the financial market, the lead underwriter will be “BDSec UtsK” JSC, and the sub-underwriters will be “TDB Securities UTsK” LLC and “Golomt Capital UTsK” LLC. In this context, the Governor's Office of the Capital city signed a cooperation agreement with the leading underwriters and sub-underwriters.

The leading underwriter "BDSec UTsK" JSC is a leading securities company in the industry, which has been continuously operating for 31 years since the beginning of the stock market relations in Mongolia. In 2006, the company became a public company through an IPO on the Mongolian Stock Exchange, and in 2021, it was selected as the "Best Broker" and "Best Investment Bank" of Mongolia. www.bdsec.mn

The sub-underwriter "Golomt Capital UTsK" LLC was founded in 2011, and is one of the market leaders, having performed 40% of all IPO and FPO underwriting services announced in the Mongolian market in the last five years. www.golomtcapital.com

Sub-underwriter “TDB Securities UTsK” LLC served as the domestic advisor for Chinggis Bond, which was issued for the first time in the international market by the Government of Mongolia. Since then, the company has attracted a total of 3.8 billion dollars of investment from foreign markets and has rich experience in international markets. Most recently, they offered US government bonds (Treasury Bill) to investors for the first time in Mongolia. www.tdbsecurities.mn

The leading underwriter, who will provide professional services as an intermediary and guarantor in the public offering of Ulaanbaatar bonds, was selected by the Procurement Department of the Capital city on the order of the Governor’s Office of the Capital city.

MEDIA AND PUBLIC RELATIONS DEPARTMENT OF THE GOVERNOR’S OFFICE OF THE CAPITAL CITY

The IESF World Esports Championship 2023 took place in Iași, Romania between August 26 and September 3, 2023.

A total of 16 teams from around the globe, including Mongolia, Sweden, Ukraine, the United States, and Egypt, converged to battle in the DOTA 2 tournament of the Championships with a prize pool of USD 100 thousand.

The Mongolian team, IHC E-Sports, topped Group B with a perfect 3-0 record, defeating teams from Jordan, Romania, and South Africa. In the Upper Bracket Semifinals, they lost to Kyrgyzstan 2-1, but they bounced back in the Lower Bracket and defeated the United States, Indonesia, and Kyrgyzstan.

The Grand Final was a close-fought battle between Mongolia and Myanmar. Myanmar took the first game, but Mongolia won the next two games and became a World Champion. Winning a major DOTA2 tournament was a historic achievement for Mongolia.

It’s a mid-winter’s day and the temperature in Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia, is 10 degrees Fahrenheit.

Wanting to keep her family warm in their yurt — a portable, circular dwelling made of a lattice of flexible wood and covered in felt — and disconnected from the city’s gas utility system, a mother burns raw coal.

Smoke soon fills the yurt. With every breath, for more than an hour, the mother and her children ingest the smoke into their lungs.

More than 6,000 miles away, in January 2020, Shamsher Warudkar read an article in the bulletin of the World Health Organization. The article says that approximately 830,00 individuals living in Ulaanbaatar’s Ger Districts — located on the hills and mountains surrounding the city — are disconnected from Ulaanbaatar’s gas utility system. A UNICEF report says the lung function of children born and raised in Ulaanbaatar, where the average winter high temperature is 8.6 degrees Fahrenheit — is only 40% of their rural counterparts.

Warudkar, an aerospace engineering student at Arizona State University, asks Professor Jared Schoepf, director of the Engineering Projects in Community Service (EPICS) program, what can be done to help.

Three years later, the mother burns more raw coal to heat the family’s yurt. But a small, solar-powered air-filtration system dissipates the smoke in less than 30 minutes.

The children breathe easier, thanks to a team of nine ASU students who saw a problem and invented a solution.

“The students were passionate on making a positive impact for the community members that needed it the most,” Schoepf said. “I’m very proud of them.”

Sun power

The project’s name is Project Koyash, named after the Mongolian god of the sun.

So far, students working on the project have sent 13 of the air-filtration systems to Mongolia, and team leader Bryan Yavari, a senior majoring in neuroscience, has formed a nonprofit corporation called Koyash, whose purpose is to raise funding for the assembly and shipment of as many units as possible.

“The goal is to obtain as much funding as we can because at the end of the day, we have the data to prove the system works,” Yavari said. “We’re working to develop a local supply chain. But that’s for the longer-term future. Right now, people’s lives are at stake, so we have to get as many units there as we can.”

The EPICS program at ASU consists of approximately 550 students whose goal is to design, build and deploy systems to solve engineering-based real-world problems centered around four themes: community development, education, health and sustainability.

“Students work with a community partner to define the problem,” said Schoepf, adding that EPICS teams are currently working on 70 different projects. “Rather than assuming the problem and the best solution for the community, the students complete a needs assessment where they work with the community to define the user needs and engineering design requirements.

“The example I love to use is that if someone said they need something that anyone in their family can use, that’s the user need. The engineering design requirement is, ‘OK, children ages 5 to 10 must be able to learn how to use the solution in under five minutes. Whatever we do must be simple enough that the children can help with the use of the solution for the long-term success of the project.'”

When Yavari, Warudkar and the rest of the team got together in the fall of 2020 (COVID pushed the project back several months), they started brainstorming by breaking the project down into two parts: What is the problem, and what are the user needs — which in this case was electrification and filtration.

Originally, the team investigated alternative fuel sources to reduce the air pollution; however, after talking with the community members, they realized those solutions were too expensive and outside air pollution would still enter their home and be unsafe for the families. Instead, they decided to investigate reducing the air pollution through filtration.

Because electricity isn’t available to families living in the yurts and Ulaanbaatar receives more than 290 days of sun per year on average, powering an air-filtration system with solar panels became the clear choice.

Solar panels outside of a yurt

The filtration system is powered by solar panels, seen here outside of a yurt in Mongolia. Photo courtesy Bryan Yavari

They connected the solar panels to a charge controller — the controller regulates the voltage supplied by the panels to batteries — and then connected the controller to a rechargeable car battery. The battery, through an inverter, was hooked up to a multi-faceted air filter — one side is an activated carbon filter and the other an air ionizer filter.

The system also contained an Arduino the team built — “it’s kind of like the brain of the system,” Yavari said, which regulates the battery percentage, turning the charging from the solar panel off if the battery percentage becomes too high. Therefore, the system will not overheat and will run autonomously.

Warudkar said that “a battery may or may not have been lit on fire at some point in the initial prototyping stages.”

Through testing

The team spent the entire 2020 fall semester testing the power system to see if all the components worked. The next hurdle was replicating the smoke-filled conditions in the yurts.

Fortunately, Warudkar’s sister, who lives in Tempe, has a shed in her backyard. The team covered up the ventilation holes inside the shed, purchased a meat smoker, packed it with coal and for nearly a year conducted tests, filling the shed with smoke in order to determine how the electrical components responded and what filters worked best.

Their system worked, obtaining an air quality index value of four; an AQI value of 50 or below represents good air quality.

Because most of the parts were purchased off store shelves, the per-unit cost came to only $400. Also, the inverter, battery and Arduino fit inside a weatherproof box that’s just 12 inches high, 8 inches wide and 6 inches deep.

“A lot of the inventions we do consist of taking parts that already exist and integrating them together in a new, unique way,” Schoepf said. “That’s something we push heavily in the class in terms of working with our international partners. The last thing we want to do is create something that’s so drastically complex there’s no way to fix it or do maintenance. This ensures long-term success of the project.”

With the invention validated, Yavari reached out to the Taiwan Fund for Children and Families, which operates in the area. The team collaborated with the Mongolian Consulate, a system was sent for testing and, soon after, 12 more were shipped to Mongolia.

“This system is great for the families in Ulaanbaatar,” said Bayar Be, one of Project Koyash’s community partners in Mongolia. “It’s easy to use and effective at filtering the air.”

Yavari is currently collaborating on a research project with pediatricians to determine the impact their solution is having on the children’s lives.

“It makes such a big difference in those children’s developmental stages for the families that are there,” Yavari added. “It can help extend and save lives.”

BY Scott Bordow

Reporter , ASU News

Scott.Bordow@asu.edu

Last year by its Decree No.296, the Government of Mongolia newly approved the Regulation on Mineral Extraction by Micro-Mining. This regulation pursues the two main objectives: increase local employment and give artisanal miners areas damaged by mining activities for use towards further reclamation.

A joint consultation of the parties implementing the regulation on micro-mining was held yesterday in Ulaanbaatar to discuss the extent of implementation of the regulation, the problems faced by the parties implementing the regulation, and solutions thereof within the year since the approval of the regulation.

The Ministry of Environment and Tourism, Ecological Police Department, Khentiy, Selenge, Arkhangai, Uvurkhangai, Bayankhongor, Gobi-Altai, Uvs, Dundgobi aimags’ environmental inspectors and soum governors, where small scale mining is active, took part in the meeting, exchanged opinions on the implementation of the regulation and got a common understanding. The participants highlighted the effectiveness of supporting formal task units and improving accountability in the fight against illegal activities. They considered impossible to implement in practice the stipulation in the revised draft of the Law on Minerals to abolish micro-mining as a concept.

The consultation was initiated by the Mongolian Union of Micro Mining and organized in cooperation with the “Building Capacity to Counter Illegal Mining” Project of the Asia Foundation. The proposals from the consultation will be compiled and submitted to the stakeholders as recommendations.

The Energy Week Central Asia and Mongolia 2023 to take place in Astana on Sept. 19-20 will focus on advancing clean and renewable energy initiatives in the regions, reported the conference’s press office.

Transforming into a clean energy hub

The conference highlights the region’s significant potential in solar, wind, and hydroelectric power, and its cooperation with international companies to transform Central Asia into a clean energy hub.

“To achieve this, fostering a robust policy framework that encourages private and foreign investments is paramount,” reads the press statement.

Attracting investments

To encourage renewable energy adoption, transparent regulations, public-private partnerships, and financial incentives such as tax breaks or subsidies are essential for attracting the private sector investments.

Attracting domestic and foreign investment is a key step toward achieving sustainable development and energy security in the region, as Central Asian countries look to diversify their energy sources and reduce their carbon footprint.

Solar and wind energy

The conference will feature detailed discussion on solar photovoltaic technologies to establish grid-connected solar farms, distributed solar installations, and off-grid systems to power remote areas.

With decreasing costs of solar panels and improving efficiency, solar energy can be used to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, enhance energy security, and create job opportunities in the renewable energy sector.

Wind energy developments in Central Asia and Mongolia present a valuable opportunity to diversify their energy mix and reduce dependence on fossil fuels.

Green hydrogen potential

As Central Asian countries are strategically positioned to become major green hydrogen exporters, the region’s green hydrogen potential is highlighted as a key driver of a low-carbon economy.

“Abundant solar and wind resources offer a unique advantage in producing green hydrogen through electrolysis, a process that splits water into hydrogen and oxygen using renewable electricity,” reads the statement.

The conference stresses that transitioning towards a greener energy mix, including hydropower, requires technological improvements, environmental considerations, regulatory consistency, and financial support.

To address these issues, the event will bring together high-level officials, state companies and banks from Kazakhstan, the Kyrgyz Republic, Mongolia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, global developers, investors, and independent power producers such as Total Eren, ACWA Power, Svevind, EDF, and Voltalia, Singaporean government-owned consultancy Surbana Jurong, the largest renewables cluster of Türkiye ENSiA, the World Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), Italian Eni, Clean Energy Asia, Delegation of German Economy in Central Asia, the International Hydropower Association, and other institutions.

As part of the Tavantolgoi-Gashuunsukhait Railway Complex Project, 811 wagons have been fully received at the border of Mongolia.

The innovative wagons manufactured at the Tikhvin Freight Car Building Plant of Russia have been produced by the most advanced technology with the designated service interval of eight years or one million km. Due to dual wheel bearings and two-cylinder brakes or double brakes, the reliability of the train movement has been enhanced, bringing the exploitation term up to 32 years.

An exploitation of the innovative wagons in the railway transportation sector of the country will not only diminish the frequency of repairs and transportation costs, but will also be highly significant in increasing the export of mining products and currency inflow, reports the Ministry of Road and Transport Development.

The upcoming China-Mongolia Expo will make a great contribution to the expansion of trade and economic ties between the two neighbors, Mongolian Minister of Food, Agriculture and Light Industry Khayangaa Bolorchuluun has said.

The expo is scheduled to take place in Hohhot, capital city of north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, on Sept. 6-10.

"Our two countries agreed to hold this expo every two years. However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it has not been held since 2019," Bolorchuluun said, noting that compared with the previous three expos, this 4th one will be held on a much larger scale.

"Preparations for the expo are generally complete. We expect that by holding the 4th China-Mongolia Expo, the volume of bilateral trade between the two countries will increase significantly," said Bolorchuluun, who leads the working group of the Mongolian side to prepare for the expo.

"China, which is our country's southern neighbor, is developing rapidly," he said, stressing that Mongolia has to keep up with the speed of China's development and cooperate with China.

"We have a lot to learn from China. Holding such an expo will allow our companies to learn (from) and exchange experiences with Chinese companies, cooperate with them and further expand trade and economic relations between the two," Bolorchuluun said, adding that during the expo, new know-how, experiences and innovations will be exchanged and agreements will be concluded.

At least 500 companies from Mongolia are expected to participate in the expo. In the previous three expos, most of Mongolian exhibitors were light industry companies, but this time more food manufactures will participate, the minister said.

"Mongolia aims to export organic food products such as meat, camel milk drinks and sea buckthorn to China. Therefore, many food manufactures are going to participate in this expo," he said.

China has been Mongolia's largest trading partner since 1999.

Mongolia and China achieved their bilateral trade target of 10 billion U.S. dollars in 2021, and are now actively cooperating in all fields to further increase the volume to 20 billion dollars, said the minister.

"So, in order to achieve the goal, I believe that it is very important to organize (more) joint events like this expo," he said.

Mongolia's foreign trade turnover expanded 27.9 percent year-on-year to 11.8 billion dollars in the first half of this year, according to the country's National Statistics Office.

China remained Mongolia's top export destination and import supplier in the January-July period, accounting for 73 percent of the latter's total foreign trade, data from the statistical agency showed.

The Minister of Road and Transport Development S. Byambatsogt met with the Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador of the Russian Federation to Mongolia A.N. Yevsikov on September 1, 2023, and agreed to jointly implement the major development project of the railway sector in the near future.

The Minister S. Byambatsogt spoke that Ereentsav-Choibalsan-Khuot-Bichigt railroad would become the central railway corridor connecting Mongolia, China and Russia. “At present, our country has only one railway crossing to China, i.e. Zamyn-Uud. By the commissioning of this railway, the number of cargos passing through Mongolia would increase, and the transportation volume of the three countries would grow hugely, which is of particular social and economic significance. Mongolia has signed an agreement with the concessionaire and is working to start the construction work in the near future. To this end, along the construction of the Choibalsan-Khuot-Bichigt railway, it is necessary to renovate the Ereentsav-Choibalsan railway. We have asked from Russia to cooperate in the start of the major overhaul in the near future”.

Also, the Bogdkhan Railway Project passing through Ulaanbaatar is critical for upgrading the capacity of the railway, creating work places in settlement areas, and reducing congestion. Since the Feasibility Study of the Project to implement in cooperation with the Russian Federation has been developed, it is required to urgently start the major overhaul, commence construction works, accelerate Zuunbayan-Sainshand railway capacity and train exchange, and establish technical compliance. Therefore, the Minister discussed with the Ambassador about intensive solution and implementation of these issues, and asked to convey them to the shareholders of the Russian side of the Mongolian-Russian Joint Venture Company "Ulaanbaatar Railway".

The Ambassador A.N. Yevsikov said that he would pay exceptional attention to immediate commencement of the major overhaul and modernization of the railway, expansion of the transport corridor of the three countries, and increase of cargo transportation. In addition, he expressed his desire to come to a consensus on how to make the Railway double-track, how to settle budgets and financing, and how to develop the Mongolian-Russian Joint Venture Company "Ulaanbaatar Railway", a symbol of friendship of the two countries, in the next 70 years.