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Background
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Climate Change and Food Security
Current trend
The Mongolian economy has been growing in recent years. However, the growth
is not translated into significant reduction of poverty. According to the 2007-2008
Household Socio-Economic Survey, the poverty level stands at 35.2% in Mongolia. This
means a total of 930,000 people live in poverty and 35 out of every 100 persons cannot
afford to buy basic food and non-food bundle (Table 1).
Table 1. Poverty level, poverty depth, consumption and GDP per capita
The poverty level was reduced from 30.3% down to 26.9% in urban areas. At the
same time it increased from 43.4% to 46.6% in rural areas. The estimate of poverty
level shows an increase in the eastern and southern dry regions by 7.9-12.2%. Poverty
depth, which estimates the deficit in consumption relative to the poverty line, declined to
8.8% in 2007 compared to 2006 and regressed back to 10.1% in 2008. Thus, there
hasn’t been a significant reduction in poverty and inequality, and the poverty level
slightly fluctuates. If this trend continues further, achieving the goal of poverty reduction
will be seriously challenged.
Challenges
The poverty level in Mongolia has reduced by a mere 1.1 point over the last
nineteen years. Halving the number of people living below the poverty line in the
remaining time is thus expected to present a major challenge. Although the economic
growth has not translated into significant poverty reduction, it offers opportunities for
poor people to mobilize their main resource - labour. International experience shows
that sufficient job generation is one of the factors leading to poverty reduction. Main
reasons why the growth of Mongolian economy is not translated into poverty reduction
are increasing tendency of magnitude and frequency of natural disasters associated
with climate change, as well as the prevalence of low employment intensity growth,
which does not allow for substantial creation of new jobs.
Therefore, in order to improve the social security of the population, measures aimed at
delivering through effective mechanisms the funds allocated to the natural disaster
management, health, education and social welfare services to the vulnerable and target
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groups, as well as reform of the social welfare system and employment generation,
need to be accelerated.
Food security is not only an explicit concern under climate change; successful
adaptation and mitigation responses in the agricultural sector can only be achieved
within the environmental and economic sustainability goals set forth in both the
UNFCCC and the Millennium Development Goals. Arable farming, animal husbandry
and forestry are among the most climate-sensitive and vulnerable sectors. Therefore
their production processes – whether for food, feed, fiber, beverage, or for livestock,
poultry, forest products – will be heavily impacted by climate change. In the next
decades, impacts in dry regions are expected to be negative, although there is still
considerable uncertainty about how projected changes will play out locally, and
projected impacts could also be altered by adoption of risk management measures and
adaptation strategies that strengthen preparedness and resilience.
Changes in agricultural production patterns will affect food security in two ways. These
are:
1. Impacts on all forms of agricultural production will affect livelihoods and ability to
access food. Producer groups less able to deal with climate change, such as the
rural herders and farmers in the country, risk having their safety and welfare
compromised.
2. Impacts on the production of food will affect food supply at national and local levels.
Dry climate condition and high frequency of weather and climate related natural
disasters in Mongolia will limit the possibilities of the country to meet the increased
food productions. Therefore, it is important to strengthen the more resilient food
supply system to changed climate condition.
Climate change will worsen the living conditions of herders, farmers, forest-
dependent people who are already vulnerable and food insecure. Malnutrition might be
increased. Rural communities dependent on agriculture in a fragile environment will
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face an immediate risk of increased crop failure and loss of livestock. Mostly at risk are
people living along dryland, Gobi deserts and mountainous regions. In general, poor
people living in both rural and urban areas will be at risk of food insecurity due to loss of
assets and lack of adequate insurance coverage.
In the new Millennium and in the era of globalization and climate change, the new
technology needs to be introduced into the most vulnerable environmental components
and economic sectors to make them independent of the environment and the weather
hazards, through renovation and improvement of conventional methods and
approaches. Today, it is impossible to provide sustainable development without
providing a correlation of economic acceleration, human growth and natural resource
utility. Mongolia has formulated and implemented a sustainable development policy as
the milestone of the state development strategies.
The measures to reduce the adverse affects on food security of the country
caused by climate change are based on impact and vulnerability assessment of climate
change on the natural resources and agriculture sector. Also, new developments and
amendments of policies and legal documents are required in order align them with
recent climate change and the latest socio-economic development updates.
The most important climate change adaptation measures and actions that are
very closely related to the food security strategies of the country are focused in the
following areas of agricultural sector:
• Land degradation, desertification and decrease of land fertility
• Natural disasters and communicable diseases
• Animal Husbandry
• Arable farming
• Water Resources
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is not easily recognized in the short term and it takes a tremendous amount of effort
and time before visible result are achieved.
Hence the priority concerns are as follows:
1. Organizing broad activities on climate change such as public awareness
campaign and many other kinds of trainings among decision making
authorities, farmers, the people working in the agricultural sector and the entire
nation;
2. Providing herders and farmers with information and new technology;
3. Inventing technology and conducting surveys and studies oriented towards
resolving the issues efficiently and to provide sustainable agricultural
development;
4. Taking management actions targeted on providing coherence between
surveys, monitoring and information
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