Posted on June, 30 2016

Children’s eco club members from Dadal and Bayan-Adraga soums of Khentii aimag have organized a study trip in February to the neighboring forest together with county officials in order to identify threats and major challenges to the forest protection. Children were shocked by detrimental behavior of adults who carelessly cut small trees and damage soils while preparing wood for household use. After the trip, children came together to discuss and find solution to reduce impact on forests, promote sustainable use of wood and reach out to adults who would ultimately change such a careless behavior. They came up with a decision to undertake a small research on how all households in the soum use forest wood for fire and then present the results to the head of local Citizen’s Representatives Assembly. During three months of research, children from two soums were exchanging information on the wood use specificity of their respective areas.
Children have involved over 300 local residents into their survey and made an analysis. The findings show that the majority or 57.6% of respondents state that they use firewood within authorized limits or less than 10 cubic meters in a year; while 15.2% confess that they overpass this limit using 15-20 cubic meters of firewood. Children have presented the findings to respective officials and asked to take some measures. They introduced the survey results during the forest consultation where over 150 stakeholders from governmental and non-governmental institutions were gathered, including representatives from the Governor’s office, Provincial Environmental Department, Onon-Balj National Park Administration, Association of Community-based Organizations of the Onon River Basin, Forest Unit of Binder soum. Children asked the Forest unit’s official and professional organizations to carry out a detailed assessment/plan of the forested area and made a proposal to halt using for 1-3 years. The officials have accepted the proposal and expressed their commitment to collaborate and support their club in the future. This was an important milestone for these children’s eco clubs in the Eastern Mongolia when children initiated a campaign, made a research and lobbied to high level local official to ban the use of forest resources for some time. 
Moreover, children made a poster to present the findings of their study and hang on the walls of their school and forest consultation hall to raise awareness of these issues.
The initiative did not stop here: it was taken up with the next actions to plant trees with seedlings and involved their peers and school students. The leader of the campaign highlighted: “We called upon all children from 1st to 9th grades to collect as much kernel of bird cherry as possible and we managed to collect 9 kg bird cherry. Then we stored the kernels in the fridge to prepare for planting, a month later we planted them. Now, we water them every day on according to agreed schedule”.