Features of Mongolian Foreign Trade: Risks for Russia

Abstract

The dynamics of Mongolia’s foreign trade over the past three decades and its leading role in the country’s economic growth are revealed. In the context of a narrow specialization in the mining industry, the growth of the Mongolian economy is strongly dependent on the export of mineral raw materials, which overwhelmingly dominate in the structure of total exports. The overwhelming majority of these cargoes go to China, whose share in Mongolia’s foreign trade turnover is growing steadily since the early 1990s, while the same one of Russia is falling. The role of Siberia and the Far East in cooperation with Mongolia sharply decreased. It has been established that the values of Mongolian exports of fluorspar, molybdenum and copper ores and concentrates exceed Russian ones, and Mongolian export of zinc and tungsten ores and concentrates, iron ore and coal are not so significantly inferior. Comparison of the prospects for increasing exports of Mongolia’s key foreign trade goods – coal and copper concentrate – with the corresponding capabilities of the eastern regions of Russia indicates an aggravation in the near future of competition between Mongolian and Russian mineral commodities for foreign markets, primarily for the Chinese. Considering this, Russia loses to Mongolia due to a much longer and, accordingly, costly output of mineral raw materials to foreign markets. Measures are proposed to reduce the risks of competition between Mongolian and Russian mineral commodities on foreign markets and to intensify their trade and economic cooperation, that includes the following: the restoration of traditional foreign trade relations, the creation of international transport corridors and the construction of new railway lines, an increase in the depth of processing of mineral raw materials, the implementation of joint large-scale projects.