Dear donors and subscribers, First, we wish you all the best for 2024! 2023 has been a busy year and truly marked a turning point for Ecosoum as it confirmed the development of our activities not only in Khishig-Undur but also in other soums of our province (and beyond). We are still working most actively on the waste issue. We have carried out new training sessions in several villages, with participations of hundreds of local citizens. We provided adequate machines and set up a small waste management center in Khantai bagh, a hamlet of 36 families located a few hours northwest of Khishig-Undur. Other activities will follow in 2024, in other soums and other regions, thanks to a new project with our partner PADEM. Long story short, we keep striving to help and support local administrations that request our help, so that they can replicate the model that we established in Khishig-Undur. |
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As we mentioned last spring, we are also increasingly working on proposing solutions for systemic change across the country. We entitled our latest report “Turning Mongolia into a Zero Waste Country,” and that is really what we are trying to do. Since the first visit the Minister of the Environment paid us two months ago, things have accelerated and we have been integrated into a small working group around him. This year, we will do our best to detail and put figures on our main recommendations, so that they can be implemented by the Mongolian government – if it decides to do so. Alongside our tangible actions in the field, we are thus really trying to prepare Mongolia for a genuine “Zero Waste” revolution. The task is arduous and may seem utopian, but we sincerely believe that, for most part, this objective could be achievable within a few years if national authorities decided to make it a priority. |
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Simultaneously, we kept working on our other fields of action. First, dozens of additional families benefited from our house insulation project in Khishig-Undur. The conditions were not yet met to start this activity elsewhere, but from this year communities of other soums that cooperate most actively with us will also be included in the project. We are beginning this replication phase with much enthusiasm as the results of the survey we conducted among our first two cohorts of insulated houses were very satisfactory: on average, during the first winter following the insulation work, involved families reduced their consumption of firewood by more than a third. Furthermore, given the financial support of the project and the increasing price of firewood, families should take only 3 to 4 years to fully recuperate the investment they made in insulation materials – after that short period, the reduction in heating expenses will translate into very appreciable net savings. |
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As for our small agricultural project in Khishig-Undur, it officially ended in 2023 – although local farmers will continue to benefit from our support in the future. The agricultural cooperative set up at the beginning of the project is gradually strengthening and still takes good care of the 9,000 fruit trees they planted since the spring of 2022. Meanwhile, we have completed the reconstruction of the old municipal cellar, in the heart of the village. The work took longer than expected, which is why the cellar was unfortunately completed a little too late to store this year's crops. But from next season, local farmers will have the possibility to properly store their crops during the winter – therefore strengthening Khishig-Undur’s food sovereignty. |
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Finally, thanks to the support of French NGO C.I.E.L.O., we completely rehabilitated an old building in the center of the village and transformed it into a toy library. It took several months to fully finalize the renovation work, but the building was opened to the public at the beginning of last October. Before then, the head of C.I.E.L.O. came from France to purchase all the necessary games with us and, more importantly, to carry out a 4-days training for the candidates to the position of games librarian. Since October, hundreds of different children have already come at least once to play in the game library, which is open twenty hours per week. |
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To end this newsletter, we kindly remind you that we are still counting on you to help us develop some of our activities. We do benefit from some large fundings that allow us to cover our main expenses. But some of our most sensitive and important actions – especially in terms of advocacy – are unfortunately not included in these large projects. The same goes for a significant part of the games library’s running costs, which the entry fee – modest so that it is affordable to all – does not entirely covered. It is thus only thanks to your donations that we can turn into reality some of our most ambitious ideas, which are often difficult to finance otherwise. If you would like to support us, our GoFundMe page is always open and completely secure – but if you prefer to use other channels, please do not hesitate to contact us directly to discuss an alternative payment solution. Thank you very much in advance. All the best, Ecosoum team --- Previous newsletters available at: www.ecosoum.org/en-news To unsubscribe from this newsletter, please let us know at contact@ecosoum.org 🇫🇷 Si vous préférez recevoir les prochaines newsletters en français, merci de nous l'indiquer à contact@ecosoum.org 🇲🇳 Хэрэв та манай мэдээллийн товхимолыг Монгол хэл дээр хүлээн авахыг хүсвэл contact@ecosoum.org хаягаар бидэнтэй холбогдож мэдэгдээрэй. |
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