U.S.Government Recommends Additional Reforms to the Government of Mongolia 

At the conclusion of the February 28-March 1 meeting of Mongolian government and external partners in Ulaanbaatar,  the U.S. Government wishes to express support for Finance Minister Bayartsaikhan’s focus on a more coherent strategy for public debt management.  The U.S. also encourages Mongolia to prudently manage the current temporary budget windfalls.

The U.S. Government would like to underscore a few additional points regarding recommended reforms for Mongolia.  Good governance, transparency, and government accountability are essential for sustainable economic development and democratic process.  Without these, no amount of foreign assistance or foreign investment will enable Mongolia to achieve economic and social prosperity.  The U.S. shares the concerns of the International Monetary Fund with respect to the lack of transparency, supervision, and accountability in the fiscal sector, especially at the Bank of Mongolia, and believes that adoption of the IMF’s recommendations will substantially improve the private sector investment climate for Mongolian and foreign businesses which, in turn, will attract the capital necessary to achieve and sustain economic growth.  

Mongolia will also need to significantly improve its investment climate by being business friendly and "squeaky clean" when it comes to corruption  A report commissioned by the U.S. Agency for International Development last year found that corruption is growing in Mongolia at all levels, both petty or bureaucratic corruption and grand or elite corruption. 

The U.S. government encouraged the Government of Mongolia to create, prior to the next technical meeting tentatively set to follow six months later, a list of specific actions it plans to take to fight corruption as an indication of Mongolia’s seriousness and political will.  Such actions can include easy tasks such as reducing corruption in citizen-to-government and business-to-government transactions by simply informing the public and businesses about how bureaucratic requirements are supposed to be handled (e.g., by posting signs in each government office with clear instructions regarding what to expect, how long it should take, and how much to pay for a service).  Mongolia also needs to develop a complete list of all the required changes in its existing law that will be necessary to make Mongolia fully compliant with its obligations under the UN Convention Against Corruption (UNCAC) and begin to draft legislation to implement the conflict of interest provisions that would apply to all Government employees.

Specific actions taken to fight corruption and correct poor governance and transparency in the fiscal sector will demonstrate the Government of Mongolia’s willingness to undertake reforms to improve the economic and social prosperity of its people.  For its part, the U.S. Government has supported Mongolia in this process and will continue to do so.