Mongolian High Minister Oyun-Erdene Luvsannamsrai paid a four-day running discuss with to South Korea from February 14-18. Since setting up a strategic partnerships in 2021, Ulaanbaatar and Seoul have made efforts to reinforce financial family members, specifically in mineral extraction, tourism, and concrete construction.
On February 15, South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol and High Minister Han Duck-soo won the Mongolian delegation led by means of Oyun-Erdene. The Mongolian top minister used to be accompanied by means of Deputy High Minister and Minister of Economic system and Construction Khurelbaatar Chimid, International Minister Battsetseg Batmunkh, Minister of Development and City Construction Davaasuren Tserenpil, Minister of Tradition Nomin Chinat, and others.
Oyun-Erdene’s discuss with to Seoul marked the primary time in 12 years {that a} Mongolian top minister had visited South Korea. Throughout the conferences of the heads of presidency, Han highlighted the importance of Mongolia-South Korea bilateral family members inside Seoul’s Indo-Pacific Technique.
For his section, Oyun-Erdene emphasised the significance of South Korea as each a buying and selling spouse and a gateway wherein landlocked Mongolia may just ship its items farther in a foreign country. “We see South Korea as one among our consumers, and the newly signed settlement between our two nations will lend a hand Mongolia business globally via seaports equivalent to Busan,” he informed Reuters.
Those high-level bilateral conferences are supposed to turn on Mongolia-South Korea financial actions, build up investments, and deepen cultural ties.
South Korea is one among Mongolia’s closest “3rd neighbors” within the area. Business, tourism, cultural exchanges, and academic cooperation with South Korea all intersect with and feature an immediate have an effect on on Mongolian society.
The Mongolian delegation’s time table in Seoul in large part rotated round Mongolia’s long-term construction plan, Imaginative and prescient 2050, and the Oyun-Erdene management’s post-COVID-19 New Revival Coverage. Mongolia and South Korea signed six new Memoranda of Figuring out (MOUs) with a number of new elements that can enrich their strategic partnership.
In accordance to the place of job of the Mongolian top minister, Mongolia and South Korea have agreed to get started negotiations on an financial partnership settlement between the 2 nations. Additionally they agreed to cooperate within the provide chain of uncommon metals; cooperate on mitigating local weather exchange; spice up their militaries’ knowledge sharing and capacity enhancement; enhance cultural actions, methods, and content material advent; and finally, cooperate in city making plans and construction initiatives.
In 2021, throughout a web based summit between Mongolian President Khurelsukh Ukhnaa and the then-president of South Korea, Moon Jae-in, the 2 leaders agreed to advance cooperation in mineral extraction, which can be used to enhance South Korea’s high-tech trade. Mongolia’s wealthy herbal assets, equivalent to copper, tin, nickel, and molybdenum have the prospective to be exported to South Korea and past.
On a broader scale, such cooperation can lend a hand South Korea’s provide chain problems, whilst Mongolia can achieve an export outlet to the remainder of the sector the usage of the Busan seaport. “I imagine Busan may just function a sea gate for Mongolia,” Oyun-Erdene informed the Korea Bring in.
“Plans are below evaluation to create a analysis staff to proceed our cooperation with Busan as a sea transit open for Mongolia.”
Along with increasing Mongolia-South Korea’s cooperation in mineral extraction, Oyun-Erdene invited South Korean buyers to participate in city making plans and construction of a brand new satellite tv for pc town at the outskirts of the newly constructed global airport within the Khoshig Valley. Consistent with a December 2022 Technical Help Record from the Asian Construction Financial institution, “The proposed satellite tv for pc town goals to draw citizens, public services and products, and financial actions these days overconcentrated in Ulaanbaatar, the capital town of Mongolia.”
The Asian Construction Financial institution (ADB) estimated the entire value of the challenge to be $200 million, of which the ADB would offer $100 million and the Mongolian govt would offer $50 million. The remainder $50 million is anticipated to return from “cofinancing [loans and/or grants] from construction companions” – in all probability together with South Korea – for a complete of $45 million and “no less than $5 million” in price range “mobilized from the non-public sector and capital marketplace.”
The theory at the back of growing satellite tv for pc towns and cities is to alleviate Ulaanbaatar’s overpopulation. As well as, if those newly established communities and concrete initiatives undertake inexperienced projects and environmentally pleasant answers, this may well be an added receive advantages for Mongolia, offering a possibility to draw funding in renewable power.
From Mongolia’s overseas coverage and financial viewpoint, sturdy financial ties with South Korea, specifically in Mongolia’s conventional power of exporting herbal assets, can lend a hand Ulaanbaatar to ascertain a couple of financial corridors. Each and every hall will function an integral a part of the nationwide economic system.
Whilst mineral business and concrete construction are integrated within the fresh MOUs, more recent projects equivalent to content material advent, tradition, and schooling can even have a sure have an effect on on Mongolia’s non-mining sectors. Mongolia additionally supported South Korea’s bid to host the Global Expo 2030 in Busan, which has been a key purpose for each the former Moon and present Yoon administrations.
