Adapting to Cascading Risks in Mongolia
The disaster riskscape of Mongolia is changing - evolving with climate change and rising uncertainties
As COVID-19 continues, countries, economies and families struggle to cope with climate-related disasters. The convergence of natural and biological hazards with climate change is creating cascading risks and vulnerabilities not seen before.
Where are these risk hotspots located? How much are the annual losses from future uncertainties?
How much will it cost to adapt to these? What should be the adaption priorities for a country?
Find out this and more for Mongolia.
Cascading Risk Hotspots
Mongolia is in the East and North-East Asia subregion under two risk hotspots. One is recurring areas of heatwave and related biological hazards and the other is recurring areas of drought and related biological hazards .
Recurring Areas of Heatwave and Related Biological Hazards.
Recurring Areas of Drought and Related Biological Hazards.
Risk in a Changing Climate
As the climate changes and becomes more variable - more population will be exposed under these risk hotspots to both natural and biological hazards.
Under the moderate climate change scenario ( RCP 4.5 ), an estimated 0.2 Million people or 5.4 per cent of Mongolia’s population will be exposed to heatwave and related biological hazards.
Under the worst-case climate change scenario ( RCP 8.5 ) this increases to an estimated 31.5 per cent.
Explore the map below to learn more.
Climate projection for Heatwave
Under the moderate climate change scenario ( RCP 4.5 ), an estimated 38 Thousand or 1.19 per cent of Mongolia’s population will be exposed to drought and related biological hazards in Mongolia.
Explore the map below to learn more.
Climate projection for Drought
Compared to other countries East and North-East Asia, Mongolia ranks 5th in terms of Average Annual Loss for floods, and 4th highest in terms of population exposure to flood and related health hazards. Mongolia also ranks 5th in terms of population exposed to drought in the sub-region. Other hazards are also emerging such as heatwaves and its associated diseases, which will create more vulnerabilities in the coming days.
How many people are exposed to both natural and biological hazards in Mongolia?
In a moderate climate change scenario, it is estimated that the total population exposed to heatwave will increase from 0.1 million in the current risk cape to 0.2 million. In the worst case scenario, it is estimated that 1 million people in Mongolia will be exposed, or 31.5% of the total population.
How many vulnerable people are exposed to natural and biological hazards?
The exposure of Vulnerable population (with low/medium Human Development Index) to heatwave and related diseases is estimated to increase from 0 in the moderate climate change scenario, to 24.6 Thousand in the worst case climate change scenario.
How much of the critical infrastructure is exposed to cascading hazards?
2.5% of health facilities infrastructure are exposed to current scenario of heatwave, which are going to increase to 32% under worst-case climate scenario.
The exposure of electricity lines to heatwave is estimated to have an increase from 5.6% (current riskscape) to 37.6% in the worst case climate change scenario.
Economic Losses
Economic losses from the hazards are increasing. Economic losses are estimated through the Annual Average loss metric (AAL).
How much is the Average Annual Loss in East and North-East Asia?
Average Annual Loss is the expected value of loss every year in a long span time-frame.
Compared to other countries in East and North-East Asia, Mongolia ranks 4th highest in terms of Average Annual Loss for drought, and 5th in terms of population exposure to drought and related health hazards.
Mongolia ranks 5th in terms of Average Annual Loss for flood, and it also ranks 5th in terms of Average Annual Loss for earthquake in the subregion,
In Mongolia, current annual average loss from all hazards - natural and biological is an estimated 0.43 Billion US dollars which is 3.3 per cent of national GDP. Economic losses in Mongolia are highest from drought.
But climate change will further impact the economic losses.
Average Annual Loss as per cent of GDP in East and North-East Asia
For the East and North-East Asia subregion, the economic losses under moderate climate change scenario (RCP 4.5) will be an estimated 785.7 Billion US dollars and under worst-case climate change scenario will increase to an estimated 1,054.2 Billion US dollars. This is 3.9 per cent and 5.2 per cent of the sub-regional GDP.
Average Annual Loss as per cent of GDP of Mongolia
In Mongolia, losses under climate change will be an estimated 0.51 Billion US dollars or 3.9 per cent of the national GDP under moderate scenario and 0.57 Billion US dollars or 4.4 per cent of national GDP under the worst-case climate scenario.
Adaptation Cost
As the economic impacts of disasters increase with climate change, investing in climate adaptation is no longer an option but an imperative.
Explore below the cost of adaption vs. annual average loss for East and North-East Asia and Mongolia. Cost of adaptation has been calculated from various sources.
East and North-East Asia
Estimated annual average loss for cascading natural and biological hazards = 476.7 Billion US dollars (2.3 per cent of GDP).
Estimated annual average loss (worst-case climate scenario) = 1,054.2 Billion US dollars (5.2 per cent of GDP).
Estimated cost of adaptation (worst-case climate scenario) = 203.9 Billion US dollars (1 per cent of GDP).
Mongolia
Estimated annual average loss = 0.43 Billion US dollars (3.3 per cent of GDP)
Estimated annual average loss (worst-case climate change) = 0.57 Billion US dollars
Estimated cost of adaptation = 0.11 Billion Us dollars (0.88 per cent of GDP)
Adaptation Priorities
Mongolia needs to invest an estimated 0.11 Billion US dollars for climate adaptation.
The Global Commission on Adaptation determined that countries across the Asia Pacific region should focus their efforts to adapt to the new riskscape on five key priorities. These are strengthening early warning systems, protecting mangroves, improving agriculture and crop production, making new infrastructure resilient, and making water resource management more resilient. These were calculated through a number of indicators.
To counter the impacts of climate change, Mongolia can get the highest return on investment by investing in making water resource management more resilient.
This will cost 41.3 Millions of USD (0.32 per cent of Mongolia’s GDP).
Investing in these adaptation priorities require information not just at the national level, but at the subnational level as well. Mongolia can prioritize certain areas that are in more need of investments in adaptation measures. To do this, Mongolia can use a composite, subnational INFORM Risk Index which scores exposure, vulnerabilities, and capacities for each district.
Systemic and cascading risks are now the new normal. The convergence of COVID-19 with other disasters has spotlighted yet again how risks interconnect – how a public health crisis can rapidly trigger an economic disaster. This is what is meant by ‘systemic risk’ and this is the kind of risk that policy makers now need to address.
All these systemic risks, biological and hydrometeorological, will be affected by the changing climate. As a result, the disaster riskscape is constantly being reshaped, so countries need to adjust their responses. Fortunately, while new threats continue to emerge, so do more agile and powerful technological tools. There is existing data which can be used by planners, disaster risk management specialists, and policymakers to identify more accurately the hotspots at greatest risk and to identify adaptation priorities.
See more of Mongolia’s exposure, vulnerability and coping capacity at the subnational level:
See how Mongolia compares to other countries:
