A H istory of L and U se in M ongolia

A H istory of L and U se in M ongolia

A H istory of L and U se in M ongolia The Thirteenth Century to the Present ELIZABETH ENDICOTT

A HISTORY OF LAND USE IN MONGOLIA Copyright Elizabeth Endicott, 2012. Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2012 978-1-137-26965-2 All rights reserved. First published in 2012 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN in the United States a division of St. Martin s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010. Where this book is distributed in the UK, Europe and the rest of the world, this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave and Macmillan are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries. ISBN 978-1-349-44403-8 ISBN 978-1-137-26966-9 (ebook) DOI 10.1057/9781137269669 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data. Endicott, Elizabeth. A history of land use in Mongolia : the thirteenth century to the present / Elizabeth Endicott. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Land use Mongolia History. 2. Land use, Rural Mongolia History. 3. Rangelands Mongolia History. 4. Herders Mongolia History. I. Title. HD920.8.E53 2012 333.73 1309517 dc23 2012016618 A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library. Design by Newgen Imaging Systems (P) Ltd., Chennai, India. First edition: November 2012 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

C ontents Listo fi llustrations vii Acknowledgments ix List o f A bbreviations xi 1 Introduction 1 2 Mongolia s Regions: Lessons in Variation 23 3 Early History 43 4 The Socialist Era 65 5 Post-1990 Developments: Who Determines Land Use in the Era of the Free Market? 85 6 Agriculture, Mining, Tourism: Competing Interests in Land Use 129 7 Concluding Thoughts 159 Glossary of Mongolian Terms 173 Notes 175 Bibliography 205 Index 219

I llustrations Coverp hotograph Ont hem ove,t öv Aimag, 1 996 Maps 1 Mongolia s Aimags 20 2 Mongolia sn aturalf eatures 21 Figures 1.1 Herders ger with satellite dish and solar panel, Zavkhan Aimag,s ummer2 005 13 1.2 SouthG obi gersw iths atellited isha ndw indmill, summer2 010 13 2.1 Cookingo nt he gers tovei nt hes outhg obi,1 996 34 2.2 Woman with argal collection basket, Arkhangai Aimag,2 002 35 2.3 Gobis aksaul,2 006 36 2.4 Zavkhan Aimagh erderso n otor,2 005 40 3.1 Ovoo n ear H ag L ake, Z avkhan Aimag, 2005. Nowadays, most ovoo are situated at sites of natural beauty (mountains, lakes), atop mountain passes, or atb uddhists acreds ites 60 4.1 Dismantledc ommunityc entern earö lziit Sum, Dundgov Aimag, 1996. Many such buildings in rural Mongolia were stripped for materials by locals once Soviet subsidies for sumc entersd isappeareda fter1 990 77 5.1 Winterl ivestocke nclosure,z avkhan Aimag, summer2 005 111

viii Illustrations 5.2 A herder does summer repair work on a winter livestock s helter, S outh G obi Aimag, 2 006 112 5.3 Winterl ivestocks heltern eara chitn uur,u vs Aimag, summer2 011 112 6.1 Davaakhuu at entrance to his model barn, Töv Aimag,2 011 142 6.2 Geri nterior,z avkhan Aimag,2 005:Ar arei nstanceo f af amilyr outineu ninterruptedb yv isitors 150 7.1 Motela ndc afé ( guanz ) on the road in Arkhangai Aimag,2 002 162 7.2 Roadside vendors along a popular tourist route, South G obi, 2 010 163 All photographs by Elizabeth Endicott

A cknowledgments First and foremost, I am deeply indebted to the Mongolian interpreters, local guides, and driver-mechanics upon whose skills I relied during my 1996, 2002, 2005, 2006, 2010, and 2011 visits to the Mongolian countryside. Without their field support and interest in my research, I would never have been able to travel as widely in rural Mongolia. For travel to Mongolia in 2002 and 2006, I received Middlebury College Faculty Professional Development Grants for which I am most grateful. Over the years, I have been most fortunate to have had the financial support of my family, and, on several occasions, I have enjoyed the company of family members on my journeys into the Mongolian countryside. I would also like to acknowledge the following individuals for taking the time to exchange ideas, opinions, and information on Mongolia: Robin Charpentier, former director of the American Center for Mongolian Studies (ACMS) in Ulaanbaatar; the late O. Pürev who in 2005 took a day to talk about Mongolia s historical geography with me; B. Erdenebolor and B. Nyamgerel of the Mongolian State University of Agriculture; the staff of the Land Office in Ulaangom; Ch. Davaadalai; Annika Ericksen; Sas Carey; Anne Cordes; Professor Emerita Esther Jacobson-Tepfer; and Evan West and Ethan West for their enthusiasm for my research project. Ethan West offered crucial technical support in formatting the manuscript along the way. Michael A. Paretti s thoughtful suggestions for selecting photographs from my voluminous personal archive of Mongolia photos from the years 1978 through 2011 were very helpful. I am grateful to Ben Meader of the Middlebury College Geography Department for producing the two maps in this book. A special acknowledgment goes to Professor Emeritus Thomas T. Allsen who read the entire manuscript

x Acknowledgments and offered incisive comments resulting in important revisions. Responsibility for any errors in the book, however, remains entirely with the author. During the research process, I benefited from comments on my presentations on land use in Mongolia, specifically at the ACMS Speaker s Series in Ulaanbaatar in 2005; the International Congress of Mongolists in Ulaanbaatar in 2006; the Faculty Lecture Series at Middlebury College in 2007; and the International Congress of Mongolists in Ulaanbaatar in 2011. Finally, a disclaimer: this book does not pretend to offer generalizations about all of Mongolia. For instance, I have never visited Bayan- Ölgii Aimag in Mongolia s far west nor have I visited Dornogov or other areas of the eastern Gobi. At a certain point, however, one simply has to write what one knows and let others pick up the storyline in t he f uture...

A bbreviations EMME MM MTW MWN SDC UBP ChristopherP.A twood. Encyclopedia of Mongolia and the Mongol Empire (New York: Facts on File, 2004). The Mongol Messenger (weekly English-language print newspaper published in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia). mongoliathisweek (now defunct online English-language newspaper published in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia), http:// www.mongoliathisweek.mn/lanl.htm. Mongolia Web News (English-language news online), http://www.mongolia-webnews.mn. SwissA gencyf ord evelopmenta nd Cooperationi n Mongolia, http://www.swiss-cooperation.admin.ch /mongolia/. UB Post (online Ulaanbaatar newspaper), http://ubpost.mongolnews.mn.