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VSO - Sharing Skills, Changing Lives

Where we do it > Mongolia - Spend five minutes with Alison Rusinow, Country Director

Could you briefly explain VSO’s role in Mongolia?

VSO has been in Mongolia since 1991 when we were asked to come in to help train English teachers. We continue to do that, with a focus on methodology and enabling English teachers to learn how to continue to develop themselves. As Mongolia has developed its market economy, growing by as much as 8 % per year, its needs have diversified, and so has the VSO programme here. The health system, although it is impressive in its ability to reach out to even remote herders, is several decades behind an international standard. Until 1991 there was no system of preventative health, but VSO is now a part of changing that. We are bringing a variety of volunteers to support the development of community-based healthcare and illness prevention. In this area, one of the most exciting programmes we are involved in is supporting national health volunteers to go into communities to raise awareness of health promotion methods.

In education, there is a huge need to address the needs of disadvantaged children in education – those who have never attended or dropped out of school, or who are treated less well than others if they do go to school. This includes disabled children, who usually have no education provision at all, but also those from poor households, who are treated differently by teachers in the classroom.

One of the major challenges facing Mongolians is finding where their country fits in a modern market economy – one third of the population are still rural herders but nearly half the population now lives in the capital city - one third of whom are without work. VSO seeks to support the herders in diversifying their livelihoods, without destroying the fragile eco-system on which they depend. VSO is also trying to be a part of steering the development of the tourism sector in a direction that benefits local communities, rather than a few increasingly rich businessmen in the capital city, Ulaanbaatar. We also support those setting up or developing micro or small businesses in rural areas, and contribute to training construction workers for the booming construction industry in the city (which currently depends on imported labour, despite the large numbers of urban unemployed).

Civil Society is quite a new phenomenon in Mongolia, as under Socialism it was strictly controlled by the state. One of the most significant ways that VSO is contributing to the development of organizations that aim to develop their communities themselves, is by building the capacity of these organizations in the area of volunteer management. VSO is becoming well known in Mongolia for its work with NGOs through work in supporting national volunteers.

What are the main challenges facing VSO Mongolia?

The Mongolian language is related to almost no other language on earth and although the achievements of our English language work so far have been impressive, most of the colleagues of our volunteers speak little or no English and for our partners it is extremely difficult to find good, affordable interpreters to work with our volunteers. Although many of our volunteers achieve an impressive level of Mongolian language, it is almost impossible for them to work through the medium of Mongolian.

There are also a fairly limited number of international donors interested in Mongolia, although those who are do tend to invest large amounts of money in their own projects here. It is difficult for VSO Mongolia to access significant sums of money to support its work here, however.

What have been VSO’s main achievements in Mongolia?

A significant number of teachers in Mongolia, those teaching English, but also pre-school teachers and teachers of technical subjects such as design, are much more focused on the needs of their students and are able to adapt their lessons accordingly, due to VSO’s presence here for the last fifteen years.
More and more health workers working in community clinics and hospitals around the country are thinking about the impact of their behaviour, such as the washing of hands, on the potential spread of disease, and health care workers have more time to spend with patients, as they are being freed up from other work due to the contribution of health volunteers, and due to improved management of their clinics.
Small business owners in three regional centres around Mongolia are producing more, employing more people, and creating more sustainable livelihoods due to advice given by trainers trained by VSO volunteers
NGOs are working more effectively to reach communities, through organized use of volunteers in their work – this is in areas such as health work (e.g. national Red Cross), social care (e.g. care of the elderly and disabled), as well as human rights (e.g. national branch of Amnesty International) and education (sending teachers to the countryside, and volunteers from education universities training current serving teachers).

Why do you think international volunteers are important in Mongolia?

Mongolia was a closed country for seventy years, although there was a considerable amount of technical advice and support from the socialist block. International volunteers can help bring the current level of services to a more international standard – currently, for example, 40,000 people a year (out of a population of 2.5 million) go abroad for medical treatment every year, as they perceive it to be better – if that improved quality of care can be brought to Mongolia, Mongolian people can be proud of what their country stands for now, rather than looking back 800 years to a time when they think this country was last great (under Chinggis Khaan).

Why are national volunteers important to development in Mongolia?

There is a tremendous amount of energy within Mongolia, for Mongolians to develop their own country and simply a lack of awareness of quite how to capture and channel that energy effectively – supporting the use of national volunteers in all sectors is a great way to create sustainable work that can be carried on by Mongolians once the international volunteers have left.

What would you say to individuals who were thinking of coming to Mongolia, in terms of what they should and shouldn’t expect?

Mongolia is a country of opposites and contrasts – very well educated and experienced IT professionals, alongside herders living the same life their ancestors did two thousand years ago. The capital city is surprisingly modern, to those who arrive expecting only wide reaching steppe landscapes with a few scattered nomadic tents. On the other hand, once outside the city that really is the reality for most of the rest of the country. It is indeed extremely cold in winter, but the skies are almost always blue and the sun shines on most days. Also, accommodation and work places are usually well heated. In summer it can be extremely hot – although dry. People usually show up late, or very late, for meetings, but many work long after the day is officially over. Most Mongolians are extremely poor, but a few are extremely rich. An average family lives in one or two rooms, or in a ger, with perhaps six or eight people in this small space, but then it’s the most sparsely populated country in the world and the Minister for Agriculture owns a house rumoured to have 54 rooms! The shining new high rises downtown could be in any city in the world, but only homeless people in Ulaanbaatar live under the streets below them – to stay near the hot water pipes in winter. And you can buy a huge variety of fruit and vegetables, but most Mongolians still rely largely on a diet of meat and flour based products.

On a lighter note, can you challenge any common misconceptions about Mongolia?

Not everyone in Mongolia can ride a horse, it’s not always cold, you can buy fruit and vegetables almost anywhere, it is very different to both Russia and China, it does have most of the characteristics of a developing country and some volunteers really do learn to love fermented mares’ milk!

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