Livestock grazing in dzud-affected pastures The 35-year old Tsetsgee (name changed) beams as she proudly shares being the recipient of the Honour Medal of Maternal Glory for raising four children, before sharing the poignant tale of the cost of climate change and desertification in the steppes of the Gobi Desert in southern Mongolia. Having grown up in Sukhbaatar, Tsetsgee moved to Omnogovi province after marrying into a family of herders who inherited the traditional occupat

A limestone mine near a herder's home in the Gobi “We did not know what mining could do till we saw it with our own eyes”, says Gerlee (name changed) as she shares the story of her fight against extractives in her village in East Gobi of Mongolia. After completing junior high school, she began living the life of a nomadic herder with four types of livestock but primarily focusing on camel rearing in the Dornogovi province. Pasturelands, herders and pastoralist lifestyle have

On the occasion of the International Year of Rangelands and Pastoralism (2026), as global delegates gather in Mongolia for the IYRP Global Pastoralists Gathering and UNCCD COP17, we the Women in Action on Mining in Asia (WAMA) stand firmly in solidarity with Indigenous and pastoral women. Across Asia, our communities face the devastating impacts of the extractives industry that continues to plunder our ancestral lands and natural resources without our Free, Prior, and Informe

In Mongolia’s Gobi region, a woman herder exposes how expanding mines have hemmed in herder families, with four to five mining sites operating within a single kilometer. As waste is dumped directly onto key grazing areas right next to their homes, herders are left with nowhere to graze their livestock or move freely. Aligned with the RED LINE initiative, the herder's story highlights the urgent need to legally protect seasonal pastures and transhumance routes from competing l

In Mongolia’s Gobi region, a local herder reveals how coal mining stripped families of seasonal pastures and degraded wool and cashmere quality with heavy dust. Grounded in the RED LINE initiative, she explains why herders demand strict ecosystem protections and Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC), declaring that no mining should ever proceed without collective community consent.

The Red Line was jointly developed by herders living in mining-affected areas, energy, and infrastructure development projects in the Gobi region, along with civil society organizations advocating for their rights, livelihoods, and environmental protection. Our position and rationale We, the nomadic herders of Mongolia, are bearers of the traditional nomadic cultural heritage and valuable contributors to national food security and the sustainable supply of livestock raw mater