Mongolia

Change links
Coordinates: 48°N 106°E / 48°N 106°E / 48; 106
From Simple English Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Mongolia
ᠮᠣᠩᠭᠣᠯ ᠤᠯᠤᠰ
Монгол Улс  (Mongolian)
Emblem of Mongolia
Emblem
Anthem: 

Location of  Mongolia  (green)
Location of  Mongolia  (green)
Capital
and largest city
Ulaanbaatar[a]
48°N 106°E / 48°N 106°E / 48; 106
Official languagesMongolian
Official scripts
Ethnic groups
(2010)
Religion
Buddhism (53%)
Non-religious (38.6%)
Islam (3%)
Shamanism (2.9%)
Christianity (2.2%)
Others (0.4%)[2]
Demonym(s)
GovernmentUnitary semi-presidential republic[3][4][5]
• President
Ukhnaagiin Khürelsükh
Luvsannamsrain Oyun-Erdene
Gombojavyn Zandanshatar
LegislatureState Great Khural
Formation
formed 209 BC
formed 1206
December 29, 1911
November 26, 1924
• Independence recognized by the Republic of China
January 5, 1946
February 13, 1992
Area
• Total
1,566,000 km2 (605,000 sq mi) (18th)
• Water (%)
0.67[2]
Population
• 2020 estimate
3,353,470[6] (134th)
• 2015 census
3,057,778[7]
• Density
2.07/km2 (5.4/sq mi) (194th)
GDP (PPP)2019 estimate
• Total
$47 billion[8] (115th)
• Per capita
$14,270[8] (93rd)
GDP (nominal)2019 estimate
• Total
$13.7 billion[8] (133rd)
• Per capita
$4,151[8] (116th)
Gini (2018)32.7[9]
medium
HDI (2018)Increase 0.735[10]
high · 92nd
CurrencyTögrög (MNT)
Time zoneUTC+7/+8[11]
• Summer (DST)
UTC+8/+9[12]
Date formatyyyy.mm.dd (CE)
Driving sideright
Calling code+976
ISO 3166 codeMN
Internet TLD.mn, .мон
  1. ^ Also spelled "Ulan Bator".
  2. ^ "Mongolian" denotes nationality, which includes minorities such as Kazakhs or Tuvans, while "Mongol" indicates Mongol ethnicity.

Mongolia is a landlocked country in East Asia and Central Asia. It borders Russia to the north and the People's Republic of China to the south, east and west. Mongolia's political system is a parliamentary republic.

Until recently, most of the people there were Buddhists. Many of them are nomads (people who always move from place to place and do not stay in one home), but this is changing. The largest city, and capital city is Ulaanbaatar. It is where about 38% of the population live. This has been spelled Ulan Bator/ Ulaan Battor and other ways in the past. The north and east parts of the country have many mountains. Part of the south part is the Gobi Desert. There are 2,791,272 people living in Mongolia. The country is the 18th biggest country in the world, with an area of 1,564,116 km2 (603,909 sq mi).

Mongolia is mainly rural with the lowest population density of all independent countries in the world.[13][14][15][note 1]

History[change | change source]

The area which is Mongolia has been ruled by various nomadic empires. This was until the great 'Mongol Empire' was founded by Genghis Khan in 1206. After the Yuan Dynasty collapsed, the Mongols became nomads again. After the 16th century, Mongolia were influenced by Tibetan Buddhism. By the end of the 17th century, most of Mongolia was part of an area ruled by the Qing Dynasty. When the Qing Dynasty collapsed in 1911, Mongolia declared independence. But they had to fight against the Chinese. They were helped by the Soviet Union. In 1921, the world accepted its independence. Shortly after the death of Bogd Khaan, the last monarch of Mongolia the monarchy was replaced by a communist government in 1924, and the country was renamed the Mongolian People's Republic. Up until the fall of the Soviet Union, Mongolia was a satellite state for the Soviets. The Mongolian Red Cross Society was set up in 1939. It has its headquarters in Ulaanbaator. Following the break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia's interest in Mongolia has declined. China and South Korea are currently Mongolia's main trade and political partners.

Government[change | change source]

Mongolia is a parliamentary republic. People vote for their government. The President of Mongolia is elected to a four-year term, and cannot be elected president more than twice. The current President is Ukhnaagiin Khürelsükh. He was first elected as president on June 25, 2021.

Climate[change | change source]

A NASA satellite photo of Mongolia

Mongolia has a steppe climate. It has very cold winters and mild summers. Recently, winters have become very cold. This has killed many people and cattle. On June 2, 2008, 52 people and 200,000 head of cattle died in heavy blizzards in Mongolia.[16]

On March 1–2, 2008, a heavy dust storm hit northeast China and parts of Mongolia. and ended over North Korea and South Korea on the March 4.[17]

Twenty one people died in a rural Mongolian blizzard on May 8, 2008.[18] Parts of the Chinese province of Inner Mongolia were also affected on the May 8, 2008.

On June 2, 2009, it was said that 15 people and 10,000 head of cattle had died by this date in Mongolia.

April 1–2, 2010 had temperatures plummet to -50 degrees in Mongolia’s Tuul valley, A nomad named Urna said she bought 400 bundles of grass to feed the animals in preparation for more bad weather. The Mongolian Red Cross has said that about 4,500,000 livestock died as a result of the bad weather this year [2010].[19][20] Tume, who lives in Ulan Bator, said that he had noticed that there were several really harsh winters in a row too. He blamed climate change, but experts said that overgrazing by cattle had also killed off most of the country’s grassland.[20]

Mongolia known as the "Land of the Eternal Blue Sky" or "Country of Blue Sky" (Mongolian: Mönkh khökh tengeriin oron - Мөнх хөх тэнгэрийн орон) because it has over 250 sunny days a year.[21][22][23][24]

Geography[change | change source]

Mongolia is the world's 19th-largest country (after Iran). It is significantly larger than the next-largest country, Peru. Mongolia does not share a border with Kazakhstan, but its westernmost point is only 38 kilometers (24 mi) away from Kazakhstan.

The geography of Mongolia is varied, with the Gobi Desert to the south and with cold and mountainous regions to the north and west. Most of Mongolia consists of steppes, with forested areas comprising 11.2% of the total land area.[25]  The highest point in Mongolia is the Khüiten Peak in the Tavan bogd massif, at a height of 4,374 m (14,350 ft).

Provinces[change | change source]

See the main article: Provinces of Mongolia

Mongolia is divided into 21 provinces called aimags. The aimags are divided into 329 districts called sums.[26]

Economy[change | change source]

The country has a lot of copper, uranium and other minerals essential to the world’s fight against climate change. The Oyu Tolgoi mine should produce about half a million tonnes of copper by 2030, the 4th biggest copper project in the world. It is run by Rio Tinto. The Mongolian government owns 34% of it. The government plans to increase gross domestic product from $15 billion in 2022 to nearly $50 billion by 2030 and halve Mongolia’s poverty rate to 15%. In 2023 84% of Mongolian exports went to China and 30% of its imports, including all its petroleum products came from Russia. There is a lot of interest from foreign investors.[27]

Languages[change | change source]

The official language of Mongolia is Mongolian, and is spoken by 95% of the population. A variety of dialects of Oirat and Buryatare are spoken across the country. Turkic languages, such as Kazakh and Tuvan, are also spoken in the western part of the country.

Today, Mongolian is written using the Cyrillic alphabet, although in the past it was written using the Mongolian script. The traditional alphabet is being slowly reintroduced through schools recently.[28]

Russian is the commonest spoken foreign language in Mongolia due to their diplomatic ties as former communist states. English has been gradually replacing Russian as the second language in order to become part of the world economy. Korean is more common now as tens of thousands of Mongolians work and study in South Korea. Interest in Chinese has been growing because of the neighboring power.

National Holidays[change | change source]

Date Holiday
January 1 New Year
January Or February Old new year (Tsagaan sar)
March 8 International Woman's Day
June 1 Children's day
July 11–15 Naadam Holiday
December 29 Independence day[29]

Related pages[change | change source]

Sources[change | change source]

References[change | change source]

  1. ↑ "Official Documents to be in Mongolian Script". UB Post. June 21, 2011. Archived from the original on November 1, 2011. Retrieved July 11, 2010.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 "Mongolia". The World Factbook. CIA. Archived from the original on July 3, 2015. Retrieved August 9, 2015.
  3. ↑ Shugart, Matthew Søberg (September 2005). "Semi-Presidential Systems: Dual Executive and Mixed Authority Patterns" (PDF). Graduate School of International Relations and Pacific Studies. Archived from the original (PDF) on August 19, 2008. Retrieved February 21, 2016.
  4. ↑ Shugart, Matthew Søberg (December 2005). "Semi-Presidential Systems: Dual Executive And Mixed Authority Patterns" (PDF). French Politics. 3 (3): 323–351. doi:10.1057/palgrave.fp.8200087. S2CID 73642272. Archived (PDF) from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved February 21, 2016. Even if the president has no discretion in the forming of cabinets or the right to dissolve parliament, his or her constitutional authority can be regarded as 'quite considerable' in Duverger's sense if cabinet legislation approved in parliament can be blocked by the people's elected agent. Such powers are especially relevant if an extraordinary majority is required to override a veto, as in Mongolia, Poland, and Senegal.
  5. ↑ Odonkhuu, Munkhsaikhan (February 12, 2016). "Mongolia: A Vain Constitutional Attempt to Consolidate Parliamentary Democracy". ConstitutionNet. International IDEA. Archived from the original on February 25, 2016. Retrieved February 21, 2016. Mongolia is sometimes described as a semi-presidential system because, while the prime minister and cabinet are collectively responsible to the SGKh, the president is popularly elected, and his/her powers are much broader than the conventional powers of heads of state in parliamentary systems.
  6. ↑ "Renewed 2015-2045 population projection". www.1212.mn. Mongolian Statistical Information Service. January 1, 2017. Retrieved May 28, 2020.
  7. ↑ "2015 population and housing by census of mongolia". www.1212.mn. Mongolian Statistical Information Service. January 1, 2016. Retrieved May 28, 2020.
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 8.3 "World Economic Outlook Database, January 2019". IMF.org. International Monetary Fund. Retrieved February 24, 2019.
  9. ↑ "GINI index (World Bank estimate) - Mongolia". data.worldbank.org. World Bank. Retrieved March 22, 2020.
  10. ↑ "Human Development Report 2019". United Nations Development Programme. December 10, 2019. Archived from the original (PDF) on May 16, 2020. Retrieved December 10, 2019.
  11. ↑ "Mongolia Standard Time is GMT (UTC) +8, some areas of Mongolia use GMT (UTC) +7". Time Temperature.com. Archived from the original on October 13, 2007. Retrieved September 30, 2007.
  12. ↑ "Clock changes in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia". timeanddate.com. Archived from the original on March 25, 2015. Retrieved March 27, 2015.
  13. ↑ Department of Economic and Social Affairs Population Division (2009). "World Population Prospects, Table A.1" (PDF). 2008 revision. United Nations. Retrieved March 12, 2009. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  14. ↑ "Population density (people per km2 of land area)". The World Bank. Retrieved May 2, 2012.
  15. ↑ "Population of all countries from largest to smallest". World Atlas. Retrieved May 2, 2012.
  16. ↑ "At least 52 dead in Mongolia snowstorm - Channel NewsAsia". Archived from the original on December 2, 2012. Retrieved June 12, 2010.
  17. ↑ "Dust Storm over East Asia". earthobservatory.nasa.gov. March 4, 2008.
  18. ↑ "Snowstorm kills 21 in Mongolia". Thaindian News. Archived from the original on March 3, 2016. Retrieved June 12, 2010.
  19. ↑ Denver's Leading Local News: Weather, Traffic, Sports and more | Denver, Colorado | 9NEWS.com | 9news.com
  20. ↑ 20.0 20.1 Welle (www.dw.com), Deutsche. "Coldest Mongolian winter in decades - DW - 02.04.2010". DW.COM.
  21. ↑ "Mongolia Climate - Retrieve the average temperatures and rains in Mongolia & in Ulaan baatar". www.e-mongol.com. Archived from the original on February 3, 2016. Retrieved November 5, 2014.
  22. ↑ "Country Nicknames: Top 40 best nation aliases". May 31, 2013.
  23. ↑ Leonov, Tatyana. "Nomadic trails in the land of the blue sky". www.bbc.com.
  24. ↑ "Weeping Camel: A Real Mongolian Tear-Jerker". Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved November 5, 2014.
  25. ↑ "3. MONGOLIAN FORESTRY SECTOR". www.fao.org.
  26. ↑ Montsame News Agency. Mongolia. 2006, Foreign Service office of Montsame News Agency, ISBN 978-99929-0-627-9, p. 46
  27. ↑ White, Edward (July 27, 2023). "Will Mongolia's crackdown on graft unlock its mineral riches?". Financial Times. Retrieved July 27, 2023.
  28. ↑ Staff, Guardian (October 27, 2006). "Mongolia: Essential information" – via www.theguardian.com.
  29. ↑ AnydayGuide. "National Independence Day in Mongolia / December 29, 2017". AnydayGuide. Retrieved September 24, 2017.

General sources[change | change source]

Notes[change | change source]

  1. ↑ The United Nations source does not order the countries according to their population densities, but mentions the population count and the area of the countries. In the World Atlas reference, sorting the countries by Population Density (km2.) shows that Mongolia is the least densely populated. The World Bank source might appear to contradict this fact, but Greenland is not an independent country; therefore, it is not considered in this case.

Other websites[change | change source]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Mongolia.
Retrieved from "https://simple.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mongolia&oldid=9175703"