Vegetables bring change in Mongolia BY KEITH RAMSAY
Tearfund has wrapped-up a successful long-term partnership in Mongolia which has seen herders rebuild their traditional way of life despite freezing winters that were killing their livestock. The unlikely answer was radical—the humble vegetable.
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raditional herders have wandered the vast Mongolian steppe for centuries, grazing their livestock and living in Gers. Their animals have been their source of food and income. But over the last decade, their way of life has come under threat due to changes in the climate. Normal winter temperatures can be around minus 35ºC, but in 20092010 temperatures plummeted to minus 50ºC, causing 700,000 animals (40 per cent of livestock) to perish. Known as a dzud, these
MONGOLIAN HERDERS TEND THEIR COMMUNITY GARDENS.
8 | Tearfund Correspondent — Dec 2020
severe winters are becoming more frequent. A dzud is when animals die in vast numbers following dry, hot summers and icy winters. Another big one occurred in 2018. After the 2010 event, the government asked Tearfund’s partner, Family Agricultural Resources Mongolia (FARM) to help families make it through these events with enough food and income to sustain them. What they came up with was radical for Mongolian herders and Tearfund
began supporting the project in 2011. FARM was going to teach traditional herders how to grow vegetables commercially to feed themselves and earn a living. The income would help them to build up their herds again. Tearfund enlisted the help of New Zealand horticultural scientist, Marlon Stufkens, to help them grow vegetables in such harsh conditions with a short growing season. He introduced rammed-earth tunnel houses which extended the growing season.
PICTURE Ian McInnes
