Earlier this month (Sept. 12), the MCC Board of Directors approved a compact with Mongolia. The compact, coming in at $285 million, is the fourth largest compact per capita since Mongolia--while territorially quite large--is the least densely populated country in the world.There are some noteworthy components to the compact.The bulk of the compact ($188 million) goes toward improving the efficiency and capacity of Mongolia’s ageing railway, the transportation and trade backbone of the landlocked, sparsely populated country. The setup of this particular project is slightly tricky since the railway operates as a joint Mongolian-Russian shareholding agreement (which has been in place since 1949). MCC funds, however, will go through a third party, the accountable entity, rather than to the joint venture directly, and all negotiation on the project will be between MCC and the government of Mongolia; Mongolia will in turn engage with the other members of the joint venture board when necessary.Interestingly, the compact was originally mostly rail-focused, but was expanded during the course of negotiations to include a vocational education project, a property rights project and a health project. This expansion should please those Congressional members and NGOs that have been concerned with the MCC concentration on infrastructure (concerns which may be misplaced). Beyond that, the latter two projects listed above do represent somewhat new types of projects, either for the MCC (in the case of property rights) or for donors in general (in the case of health).Though several other compacts have property rights projects, Mongolia’s project is unique in that its focus is exclusively urban. It addresses suburban and peri-urban land rights in the crowded suburbs around Ulaanbaatar and other cities, whereas the other MCC land and property rights projects to date have a more rural or rural-urban mix focus. Urbanization is rapidly increasing in all regions of the world (Mongolia has gone from 35.7% urban in 1960 to nearly 57% urban currently), and I expect we may see more urban/peri-urban focused projects as developing country cities look for ways to accommodate and serve an influx of new residents and laborers.The health project is particularly innovative and noteworthy in that it targets non-communicable diseases (NCDs) and injuries. This is noteworthy because, as CGD’s Rachel Nugent blogged, despite the ubiquity of NCDs in the developing world (as reported in the World Bank’s recent report, Public Policy and the Challenge of Chronic Non-communicable Diseases), donor response has for the most part been that of inattention. A recent Economist article (“The maladies of affluence,” 8/11/07) illustrates this by saying, "Combating chronic disease is not part of what the UN calls its 'universal framework for development.'" Nugent expands on this saying there are "virtually no major donor programs to combat chronic NCDs in poor regions of the world" (although a new intiative is in the works). Meanwhile, according to the MCC, Mongolia’s mortality and morbidity rates from cardiovascular disease and cancer--what many consider, misguidedly, to be developed country diseases--are the major cause of death and disability in the country and impose a heavy economic burden. The government of Mongolia and its partnership with MCC are at the forefront of taking on these important health management issues and recognizing the gravity of non-infectious diseases in developing countries.
CGD blog posts reflect the views of the authors, drawing on prior research and experience in their areas of expertise.
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