Recent news
OT gold output to double in 2018
Oyu Tolgoi is expected to produce 125,000 to 155,000 tonnes of copper and 240,000 to 280,000 ounces of gold in concentrates in 2018, according to a production and financial guidance released by Rio Tinto-controlled Canadian miner Turquoise Hill,
Copper will take the crown from coal in 2018
For Mongolia, 2017 ended as the year of Mr Coal. Economic growth surpassed expectations mainly because coal exports earned revenue beyond projection, despite an unanticipated slowdown in the second half of the year.
Group studies the economics of water, and is worried
Mongolia has two major water consumption areas – Ulaanbaatar and the southern Gobi region. The first has population pressure, while the second is where mining and economic activity will become more and more intense.
A mining-eye view of the year that was
Looking back at 2017 as a whole, one sees it as a year of both positives and negatives for the country’s development, and also as a period when the mining sector was kept busy throughout.
Modern Mongolian mining is 95 years young
The Mongolian extractive sector, in its modern avatar, completed 95 years in 2017. Archaeological relics indicate that Mongolians practised mining 5000 years ago, but scientific mining began in 1922, with the post-People’s Revolution government deciding to commence coal extraction work at Nalaikh.
Major changes in licence allocation process
Some basic features of the system of issuing mining licences, in force for the past 20 years, have now been changed. Allocation after application is out, replaced by a selection process.
Shanxi likely to buy more Mongolian coking coal
Shanxi province in Central China has 55 percent of the total coking coal reserves in the country and produces 40.74 percent of the country’s coking coal -- the raw material to produce coke – but even then it now looks set to become a major purchaser of Mongolian coking coal, as Shanxi’s coking industry is being expanded in a big way.
“Mongolians can do TAVANTOLGOI extraction work themselves”
N.Ariuntuya finds out from the Executive Director of Erdenes Tavan Tolgoi, D.Ariunbold, about the present state of affairs in the company, and the likely challenges ahead. Some bold decisions are long overdue to fulfil the company’s potential but these can be taken only at the political level.
A tale of lost chances
The graph shows how coal export reached its peak volume in June, only to slide sharply in July, recovering but slightly in August and staying more or less the same in September. Reports so far this month do not promise much of a change.
The IMF program “will not solve structural problems”
Prof. Dr. Hans-Werner Sinn, who retired in 2016 as President of the Ifo Institute and Director of the Centre for Economic Studies in Munich, Germany, was in Mongolia in 2013 and then again in August-September, 2017.
Coal’s way
The restrictions recently imposed on coal trucking in China’s eastern and northeastern provinces have had a negative impact on Mongolia’s coal exports, as that region is where much of the country’s coking coal imports are consumed.
Geological information goes online soon
It is widely accepted that potential foreign investors in the geological and mining sector will look for an improved legal environment and stable policies, but no less important is to allow them easy and detailed access to geological information.
What young professionals can learn at capacity-building workshops
Young professionals perform the bulk of the work in many organizations and institutions in Mongolia, including in the mining sector. In the government bureaucracy, young professionals are often the first to draft policy documents, thereby contributing to the process of policy discussions and changes.
The Outlook for Coal
As noted by the International Energy Agency (IEA) coal supplies a third of all energy used worldwide and makes up 40% of electricity generation, as well as playing a crucial role in industries such as iron and steel. Coal is also very important for Mongolia, as it is one of Mongolia’s major exports.
Coal claims 40% share in total exports, trade turnover rises 34%
The National Statistical Office reports that foreign trade turnover at the end of July reached $5.9 billion, showing an YoY increase of 33.9% or $1.5 billion. In the same period, exports increased by 38.5% or $979 million to stand at $3.5 billion, while imports rose by 27.5% or $504 million and reached $2.3 billion. The foreign trade balance grew 67% YoY, and showed a surplus of $1.2 billion.
Aspire starts work on Erdenet-Ovoot railway
Work on laying the tracks of Australia-listed Aspire Mining’s 547-km-long Erdenet-Ovoot railway formally began on 20 June. The project has been entrusted to Northern Railways LLC, a subsidiary of the company, and is expected to be ready for traffic in 2022. When complete, the railway will go up to the Russian border at Arts Suuri, where it will be connected to the Russian Trans Siberian Railway through Kyzyl city’s port, and thus become part of the Russia-Mongolia-China Economic Corridor.
