CNN interview with Mongolian Prime Minister s.Batbold
Prime Minister of Mongolia S.Batbold gave a live interview from Central Square to a CNN correspondent. He talks about the problem of what to do with the large sums of money expected from the mining sector in the coming years. He made a couple of points.
One is that Mongolians look around the world for solutions that work. Another is that open governance standards will be vital in these matters. He also mentioned that part of the Tavan Tolgoi coal mine revenue will be distributed to Mongolian citizens by giving them preferred stock in the project. Mongolia is still a developing country. But if things go according to plan, development could be rather fast.
The following is his conversation with CNN’s Anna Coren.
-What challenges currently face Mongolia?
-I think my country is blessed by God with abandoned natural recourses, with vast land and with vey smart people. But the important thing now is how do we convert these abandoned natural resources to the benefit of people to the prospect of the country. That’s the challenge of the people and most importantly
-the challenge of the government. We would like to convert into the development, prospect. First of all to our citizens, for education, for health and for job opportunities.
-How does Mongolia avoid the danger that could occur?
-Yeah. I think we talk a lot these days, especially in the last couple of years about the resource course and I think that there are many good experiences and certain lessons from different countries we could learn from and we can benefit from those lessons.
We should learn and copy good examples, we have seen the Norwegian experience of sharing the benefits and we have seen the Chilean stability fund. I think we are learning from these good experiences and the most important thing is that we focus on the government’s issue.
-Mongolia is a very old country with a young democracy of the 1990s, so it means you can pick and choose the best things of each country and form your own country. Now I want to talk a little bit about the gap between the rich and poor, because a third of your country does live below the poverty line. I know the government is introducing a share distribution plan involving the Tavan Tolgoi coal mining project. Is this the first of many projects where you will distribute shares to all citizens of Mongolia?
-Yes, this will be the first project but the real challenge is how do we benefit people in Mongolia
from this huge revenue which we are expecting from the mining developments and from the major strategic projects. We have created a fund called the Human Development Fund, through which we channel
the revenues. We channel this for the education of the people, for the health of the people, to create job opportunities and for housing and other needs of the people, so that the people get fair shares and fair revenue from the mineral opportunities. We are also issuing preferred stock to the each individual, to the citizens of Mongolia from the coking coal deposit which is called TT.
One is that Mongolians look around the world for solutions that work. Another is that open governance standards will be vital in these matters. He also mentioned that part of the Tavan Tolgoi coal mine revenue will be distributed to Mongolian citizens by giving them preferred stock in the project. Mongolia is still a developing country. But if things go according to plan, development could be rather fast.
The following is his conversation with CNN’s Anna Coren.
-What challenges currently face Mongolia?
-I think my country is blessed by God with abandoned natural recourses, with vast land and with vey smart people. But the important thing now is how do we convert these abandoned natural resources to the benefit of people to the prospect of the country. That’s the challenge of the people and most importantly
-the challenge of the government. We would like to convert into the development, prospect. First of all to our citizens, for education, for health and for job opportunities.
-How does Mongolia avoid the danger that could occur?
-Yeah. I think we talk a lot these days, especially in the last couple of years about the resource course and I think that there are many good experiences and certain lessons from different countries we could learn from and we can benefit from those lessons.
We should learn and copy good examples, we have seen the Norwegian experience of sharing the benefits and we have seen the Chilean stability fund. I think we are learning from these good experiences and the most important thing is that we focus on the government’s issue.
-Mongolia is a very old country with a young democracy of the 1990s, so it means you can pick and choose the best things of each country and form your own country. Now I want to talk a little bit about the gap between the rich and poor, because a third of your country does live below the poverty line. I know the government is introducing a share distribution plan involving the Tavan Tolgoi coal mining project. Is this the first of many projects where you will distribute shares to all citizens of Mongolia?
-Yes, this will be the first project but the real challenge is how do we benefit people in Mongolia
from this huge revenue which we are expecting from the mining developments and from the major strategic projects. We have created a fund called the Human Development Fund, through which we channel
the revenues. We channel this for the education of the people, for the health of the people, to create job opportunities and for housing and other needs of the people, so that the people get fair shares and fair revenue from the mineral opportunities. We are also issuing preferred stock to the each individual, to the citizens of Mongolia from the coking coal deposit which is called TT.
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