Jul 24, 2023
Message from the Team Lead
Dear Friends, Partners, and Colleagues,
We have now reached the end of what has been a very exciting 2022-2023 fiscal year, that saw the implementation of 8 key activities, with the delivery of over 38 research studies and reports, and more than 56 trainings, workshops, seminars, and events held between July 2022-and June 2023. Overall, we had the participation of approximately 3,115 individuals, including 1,856 community members and youths as well as 154 participants representing civil society who actively engaged within our program activities.
In continuing our support in strengthening Mongolia’s extractive sector environment this year’s activities focused on good governance, responsible mining, the environment and communities, and gender human rights and inclusion. AMEP 2 provided support to its collaborative partners on the “hot-topic of Royalties and Taxes, building on previous research, to deliver a 3-Options Consensus and Consultation piece that saw over 200 participants from industry, civil society, and government in attendance.
A responsible mining sector can bring positive impacts, opportunities, and benefits to sector stakeholders, while reducing risk, and encouraging long term sustainability. The road towards responsible mining and Environmental (E), Social (S) and Governance (G) has been interwoven in many of AMEP2s’ activities. This fiscal year we collaborated with the Mongolian National Mining Association in the implementation of its’ Responsible Mining Framework that saw a positive uptake with some 37 companies embracing the framework. We also teamed up with PWC and raised awareness around ESG’s, where we presented AMEP2’s first extractive sector ESG Toolkit.
Communication, collaboration, and communities played a central role in the 2022-2023 activities where local level studies on community perceptions and grievances aimed to identify and raise awareness around community, company, and government relations that have direct, indirect, and induced consequences on the extractive sector. With the participation of the soums of Altanshiree (Dornogovi), Khuld (Dundgovi), and Buregkhangai (Bulgan), a “Journey to Explore Geology and Mining” community event series were implemented to bring stakeholders together. These events aimed to raise awareness around geology and the Mine Life Cycle as well as provide opportunities for shared learning with the introduction of license holders/companies to community members and herders. Geology was also a focus of this activity which saw the participation of some 667 soum level students learn about geology and their local environment. Linking into this activity AMEP2 through 2 independent research studies undertook analysis of social conflicts between companies and communities, examining judiciary and non-judiciary cases and situations.
Building on last year’s development and implementation of the Gender, Human Rights, and Inclusion (GHRI) 7-Module online training program for companies, AMEP 2 undertook a monitoring and evaluation exercise that identified over 1,100 mining company employees who have participated in these free online courses, that are currently hosted on the Ministry of Mines and Heavy Industry Gender Portal website.
Other highlights of this year’s activities have included the Strengthening of Professional Associations through management and ISO/IEC training, and the development of an Inter-operational Information Platform Roadmap to improve information flow and efficiency between the Ministry of Mines and Heavy Industry and its authorities.
Overall, it has been a busy fiscal year that will be met with the slow winding down of AMEP 2’s final year of operations (July 2023-March 2024). On this note we would like to express our gratitude to the many individuals who have worked and contributed to making our this year’s activities a success, as well as to our dedicated collaborative partners and the countless participants who have engaged in our AMEP2 events. We look forward to continuing to engage with you.
Thank you again for your continued support.
Kind regards,
Rena Guenduez