Why This Matters

Across Mongolia's grasslands, pastoral communities face mounting pressures from climate extremes, changing markets and the gradual erosion of traditional stewardship systems.

For generations, herders managed these landscapes through seasonal movement, careful observation of pasture condition and deep knowledge of local ecosystems. This traditional ecological knowledge helped communities adapt to highly variable environments while maintaining healthy grasslands.

Today many of these knowledge systems are under pressure. Severe winters, droughts and changing economic conditions make stewardship increasingly difficult, while younger generations have fewer opportunities to learn the practices and ecological understanding that guided earlier generations.

At the same time, many restoration initiatives define communities according to administrative boundaries and externally produced maps. Yet the communities that actually steward rangelands are formed through relationships, seasonal grazing patterns, shared water sources and collective histories. These living stewardship landscapes rarely align neatly with official boundaries.

Without strong stewardship communities, lasting landscape restoration is difficult to achieve.

Our Approach

We work with pastoral communities across Bayankhonghor, Hustai and Arkhanghai to strengthen the social foundations of landscape stewardship.

The process begins with participatory mapping. Communities identify the landscapes they collectively depend upon, defining stewardship areas based on lived relationships with place rather than administrative boundaries. This helps create a shared sense of ownership and responsibility for the land.

Traditional ecological knowledge is then brought together with ecological monitoring using handheld tools developed by our partner URECA. Community observations of pasture condition, wildlife, water availability, seasonal change and landscape health are combined with contemporary monitoring approaches to support better stewardship decisions.

By integrating traditional knowledge with practical monitoring, communities gain both the confidence and the tools needed to guide long-term restoration efforts.

Stewardship Leaders

A central element of the project is the identification and support of local stewardship leaders.

These individuals are selected from within participating communities and act as facilitators, organisers and community galvanisers. They coordinate stewardship activities, support ecological monitoring, encourage participation and help connect younger and older generations of herders.

For many participants this represents the first opportunity to earn income linked directly to caring for ecosystem health rather than livestock production alone.

These stewardship leaders help transform restoration from a short-term project into an ongoing community responsibility.

How Funding Will Be Used

Funds raised through this campaign will support:

Community stewardship gatherings and knowledge exchange events
Participatory mapping of community stewardship landscapes
Training and support for local stewardship leaders
Ecological monitoring activities using URECA handheld devices
Travel and coordination between participating communities
Documentation and sharing of stewardship practices and lessons learned

The funding will strengthen existing community initiatives and relationships rather than creating new structures, helping communities build the capacity needed to steward their landscapes over the long term.

What Success Looks Like

Success is measured not only through healthier grasslands, but through stronger stewardship communities.

Through this project we aim to:

Strengthen community ownership of stewardship landscapes
Support local stewardship leaders in three pastoral regions
Facilitate knowledge exchange between generations of herders
Improve community participation in ecological monitoring
Strengthen stewardship planning and collective decision-making
Build practical foundations for long-term landscape restoration

Alongside ecological indicators, we will document stories, experiences and lessons from participating communities to understand how stewardship knowledge is being renewed and applied.

Looking Ahead

We believe lasting restoration requires relationships that are both ecologically and economically resilient.

The stewardship institutions supported through this project provide the foundation for future reciprocal partnerships that reward responsible care for the land. By strengthening community organisation, stewardship leadership and ecological monitoring today, communities become better positioned to participate in long-term investment and responsible sourcing relationships linked to healthy landscapes.

In this sense, the project is catalytic. It helps communities build the social and ecological foundations needed to restore Mongolia's grasslands while creating pathways towards a future in which stewardship itself is recognised, valued and rewarded.