DISCUSSION ON ESTABLISHING RESOURCE FUND CONCLUDED

Ulaanbaatar /MONTSAME/ Such a discussion was organized by the Secretariat of the State Great Khural and the Natural Resource Governance Institute on May 12 at the State House. A chair of the discussion R.Amarjargal MP said the event is held in frames of the implementation of the Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation signed by the SGK Secretariat and the NRGI. He said that a working group, headed by him, has been formed to take charge of the development of a bill on Resource Fund. According to a study conducted by international institute, 15 percent of the territory of Mongolia has undergone geological researches, a total of 6 thous. deposits have been discovered, of which 400 has been evaluated in terms of reserves, Mr Amarjargal said. "Only 200 deposits are being operated, which urges us to further study our resources," he added. This discussion was held with a purpose to discuss and learn the practices in terms of legal environment for natural resources management and to share information, he concluded. A senior economic analyst at the NRGI Mr Andrew Bauer gave a presentation about the results of analyses on the draft law on resource fund and follow-up recommendations, roles of macroeconomic policy and resource fund, sustainable financing for the fund and fiscal transparency, public reporting and communications, coordination mechanism in the fund, and about executive monitoring procedures. According to him, the NRGI recommends that the Government of Mongolia unite the Human Development Fund to the Fund for Future Generations and issue a regulation to accumulate four percent of the five-year yield from the Resource Fund to the State Budget. "It will allow citizens to ripe the benefits of the Fund for Future Generations in a shorter period of time," he said. Moderators of the discussion were the President’s adviser on Civil Participation and Economic Policy L.Dashdorj, and the head of the Natural Resource Management Division B.Togoldor. Present were also S.Oyun MP, members of the working group in charge of the development of the bill on resource fund, delegates of the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank and the Embassy of Canada in Ulaanbaatar, also policy analysts, scholars and representatives from other related institutions.