The Worldwide Day to Combat Desertification has been observed on June 17th since 1995 to promote public awareness relating to international cooperation to combat desertification and the effects of drought.

Mongolia is vulnerable to desertification due to its geographic position, climate conditions and ecosystem where humidity is very low and in dry regions.

Almost 90 percent of the total territory of Mongolia is newly at risk of desertification while 44.7 percent is already severely affected by desertification.

Over 700,000 square km of the affected area is in the Gobi Desert and plain areas in Mongolia.

Over the past decade, drought affected an extended area of 3.4 percent, in the worse  affected areas it extended 5.4 percent, and in severely affected areas desertification extended 1.8 percent.  The bad news is more than 50 percent of these affected areas are in Dundgovi, Dornogovi, Uvurkhangai and Umnugovi aimag, areas that are alreadt severely affected by desertification.

This is less to do with natural factors or climate change but more to do with human development.

It is estimated that over 70 percent of 126.6 million hectares of grassland was destroyed to be replaced by green crop plants. Other factors of desertification related to human activities are also explained through the domination of goats in dominated livestock. The goats hooves damage the soil and eat roots of plants. Also haloxylon, a genus of shrubs or small trees in the Gobi Desert that curbs the sand movement, has been reduced greatly through cutting.