Page 67 - bne magazine November 2021_20211104 uzbekistan risding

bne November 2021 Eurasia I 67
a garden, or a cellphone, but they did have a landline and solar electricity
for their ger. They also had a TV.
The couple have always of course gathered their own herbs for cooking, while picking berries for preserves. They make their own vodka and their own rope. They also make their own Mongolian deel, or traditional clothing.
According to Munkhbat, about 200 small animals, meaning goats or sheep, would be considered a subsistence level of animals. Richer families, those with 500-1,000 small animals or with large numbers of horses and camels, may be able to hire an assistant herder to care for their animals, while they move to the city.
The couple from Uvs tell how they have over 40 horses, 50 cattle, 800 sheep and 200 goats. Plus, the father is 57-years old, so he receives a small pension from the government. “Our home situation is just so-so. We have a few animals, but then again we have seven children, nine people in our family, and some of them have gone independent and some are attending universities so... it’s difficult.”
“Right now, we’re selling a litre of milk directly from outside our home at 300 tughrik [about 10 US cents]. And when us herders walk into the store, what can we buy with 300 tughrik?"
Generally speaking, herders do not have a lot of cash. This couple say that between the milk and meat from their animals, supplemented with flour they buy in town, their family has enough to eat. When asked if they have enough money, the father jokes: “Money is sometimes there when needed, and sometimes not there when needed.”
He then broke down their annual cash income. They receive large sums of cash about twice a year when they sell animals. An adult sheep can
fetch between 170,000 to 250,000 tughrik ($60 to $88) at retail. Out
in the countryside, selling through a middleman, herders may only receive around 60,000 tughrik (about $20), for a completely skinned, gutted, and dressed out animal. If the couple sell 100 sheep
each year, they will take in a maximum of about $2,000. Additionally, they say they earn about two million tughrik ($700) per year from wool. But they had to spend money to buy and raise the sheep and money from the sale has to be used to buy replacement animals. The pension they receive used to be 230,000 tughrik per month, but was recently increased
to a monthly 250,000. So, all together, the family has an annual cash income of around $3,600, which, again, is not all profit and has to be stretched to support nine family members.
Enkhee, a former herder, now living
as more of a stationary rancher, 70 kilometres from Ulaanbaatar, explains how camels and horses have much higher earning potential than lambs and goats, particularly for those, like himself, living near a city. Among other uses, camels and horses can be used to take tourists on trips, which can earn as much as $150 per day, per tourist. That means, he can earn from a horse in a single day what he can earn from raising and selling two or three sheep.
As lucrative as tourism is, horseracing is by far the most profitable use of livestock. A horse, bred for racing, which has not even won a single race as yet, can be as valuable as a whole flock of sheep. Once a horse wins, it can be worth dramatically more.
“Those horses cost more to keep than a human,” says Enkhee. “Between food, medical, training...they eat wheat, not
grass, and they have to be kept in doors at night and in winter.” It is all but impossible for regular herders to raise racing horses. “They cannot be earning money unless the horse wins, and the horse cannot win unless all of this money is spent on their upkeep.”
Munkhbat relates how wealthier herders buy an apartment in the city. Some family members stay behind, to care for the herd, while the others move to the city to work and go to school. If things turn out badly, out on the steppes, and the family has to quit herding, they
have the security of knowing they own an apartment in the city. So, they have that to fall back on. For small herders, however, the move to the city may be a one-way trip. It could cost them their entire herd to move to the city, get set up and begin looking for work.
“The main reason herders come to the city is for economic opportunities.” Munkhbat says. Out on the steppes, large, commercial herds are getting larger, while small herders are being squeezed out. Also, herders face natural calamities, such as sandstorms or dzud, a cyclical disaster of extreme weather. Dzud kill millions of Mongolian livestock every few years. If a small herder loses all of their animals, they have no choice but to move to the city and find a job.
“There is a lifestyle change occurring among young people.” said Munkhbat, describing why so many are leaving
Only a small percentage of today's herders in Mongolia can be said to be true nomads.
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