Youth in Mongolia
[3] The steady increase in youth will enlarge the already large proportion of working-aged individuals and create new opportunities to build human capital and facilitate economic development.
[10] The transition from a Soviet satellite state to a sovereign nation in 1992 fueled major structural changes in Mongolian youth lives.
The transition to a market system is the cause of higher illiteracy and drop out rates because many poor, rural households experienced economic hardships after the closure of cooperative farms.
[7][9] Youth with vast human capital are able to move to larger aimag centers to continue their studies.
Most higher secondary education and colleges are only available in large city’s like Mongolia’s capital Ulaanbaatar.
Gender gaps in employment opportunities are present, in which young men have a higher unemployment rate compared to female counterparts.
[7] Academic training is preferred over technical education and vocational skills which has resulted in unfilled positions in trades.
The World Health Organization surveys found that youth's knowledge about contraceptives was high while use was low.
Of the 1044 youth surveyed between the ages of 15 and 19 reported that 92.7% had knowledge of any modern method, 3.7% were currently using male condoms, IUDs and pills, and 33.5% knew that contraceptives were distributed without charge.
[11] The 2010 Global School based Student Health Survey revealed that 79.4% of youth had consumed alcohol once a month or less.
[6] The World Health Organization has classified Mongolia as a low-prevalence STI country, yet the risk environment is increasing.
The main goal of this project was to reduce risky sexual behavior and develop programs that address issues of prevention for youth.
The results from the study indicate that respiratory diseases and neurodevelopment disorders among youth are common due to significant exposure to outdoor and indoor air pollution, metals, tobacco smoke and other chemical toxins.
The transition to a market economy has brought about rapid urbanization and a change in modern-day youth identities.
After the dissolution of Soviet control, nearly half of Mongolian Kazakhs youth and their families left Mongolia to find new sources of economic livelihood.
[20] Many of these youth were traditional livestock herders and were expected to conform to gender roles; the move to Kazakhstan proved to be dismal and by 2000 over one third that migrated came back to Mongolia.
[20][21] Steven Harrell's book, Cultural Encounters on China's Ethnic Frontiers, reveals identification with Mongol heritage differs for rural and urban youth.
Pastoral rural Mongol youth identify their nomadic way of life was a basic foundation of Mongolian identity.
Urban youth viewed and required ethnic education as a way to create a cultural space and to understand their common mythical history and family ties to the Mongolian population as a whole.
