Parts of speech

“Is Mongolia the place to be, or is it Colombia? We vote Mongolia but mining companies have to make a decision based on certainty and stability.”

Bernard Guarnera, president of Behre Dolbear.

“Bureaucracy has been the gest hurdle; it’s the gest issue you face. On the positive side, I’m not sure there’s anywhere else in the world where you can go out and find world-class deposits just outcropping from the terrain.”

Peter Akerley, chief executive of Erdene Resources.


“This place can do really well unless the government screws it up. The gest risk in my opinion is government interference. The second is if the Chinese quit buying -- if they do that, the whole thing collapses.”

Edward Rochette, Chairman of the East Asia Minerals Corporation.

“A transparency agreement would introduce and strengthen international best practices in Mongolia, thereby improving the business environment.  Among other things, it would provide opportunities for the business community to provide input into pending new legislation that affects trade and investment.  It would also ensure that U.S. companies can compete on a transparent and level playing field when they invest and do business in Mongolia.”
Jonathan Addleton, U.S. ambassador.

“The final investment agreement will take into consideration the interests of our two neighbours.”

S. Batbold, Prime Minister.

“There has been a lot of reporting of rumours about Tavan Tolgoi but as far as we are concerned it is not finalised yet. All 15 of the companies bidding for mining rights there are still in the running.”

B.  Enebish, Erdenes MGL Executive Director.

“We have a law saying investment from no foreign government should exceed 1/3 of total foreign investment in the country. This is to safeguard Mongolia’s national interests and is not meant to be against any country. Tavan Tolgoi will show if the Government implements or ignores this principle of national security. The most crucial issue today is to manage our natural wealth and live in peace. Everything depends on only a few people’s decisions.”

M. Batchimeg, the president’s national security adviser.

“Negotiations have just started with the Shenhua Group, Peabody Energy, a consortium of Russian, Korean and Japanese companies. The government is waiting to see how Parliament wants to proceed on several issues. The slow progress has been deliberate because it is our intention to develop this into a world-class mine. We would also like to see how serious these investors are; we want to see good proposals.” 

Ch. Khurelbaatar, Minister and chief of the cabinet office.

“Mongolian policies have fluctuated very consistently in line with global commodity prices. Ten years ago mining legislation was very liberal and the mining sector was business as usual: ‘Please provide jobs, pay taxes, thank you very much.’ Only when prices started going up did things start to change and we swung from having very liberal policies to more left-wing policies. This was a natural reaction.”

Ms. S. Oyun, Civil Will MP.