2.1. The contested definitions of ‘water security’

Generally speaking, water security refers to the sufficient availability of freshwater in terms of both quantity and quality at the right time and place [6]. However, the concept of water security is broad and has been taken up in a broad range of disciplines and contexts [5]. There is no single, universally accepted definition for water security. Definitions and applications of this term have varied across disciplines, regional contexts and over time [14].

The Global Water Partnership (GWP), an international network established in 1996 to promote the use of integrated approaches to water management, provided an early definition of water security in the year 2000. They stated that it was the condition in which “every person has access to enough safe water at an affordable cost to lead a clean, healthy, and productive life while ensuring that the natural environment is protected and enhanced” [15]. In 2013, UN-Water proposed an updated working definition of this concept which has served as a benchmark for international organizations to define and conceptualize water security over the past decade. Water security was defined as “the capacity of a population to safeguard sustainable access to adequate quantities and quality of water for sustaining livelihoods, human well-being, and socio-economic development, for ensuring protection against water-borne pollution and water-related disasters, and for preserving ecosystems in a climate of peace and political stability” [16].

Over the years, other definitions of water security have emerged from the academic and scientific literature [17]. These have incorporated the key dimensions of the UN and GWP definitions but have provided context-specific adaptations. Grey and Sadoff [18], for example, emphasize the potentially destructive impact of water in their definition through the consideration of ‘water-related risks’. Aboelnga et al. [19] notice that few water security definitions apply to the urban level and so develop a working definition that encompasses the understanding of context-specific synergies and trade-offs between systems which apply to urban water security. Definitions have also varied geographically depending on local risks, needs and perceptions. In the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, for example, water security has been closely aligned with national security concerns given the increasing freshwater demand in an unstable geopolitical context [20,21].

Whilst water security is an emerging concept for which a number of definitions and applications have emerged over the past decades, it remains a fundamental concept in international development [22]. This paper seeks to contribute to discussions around this theme by focusing on water security in the urban context of Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.

2.2. The urban focus of water security

Traditionally, water assessments have been undertaken at the basin-scale which accounts for hydrological boundaries, with the noticeable exception of Household Water Insecurity Experiences (HWIE) literature. This study actively chooses to narrow down the focus to urban water security given that a basin-wide study could obscure the challenges facing Ulaanbaatar specifically. As the Tuul River Basin Report Card [23] shows, measures of water quality, quantity and management, among other factors, vary greatly throughout the course of the Tuul River, ranging from what is classified as ‘good’ river health upstream to ‘poor’ in the downstream region of the basin.

The urban focus on water security draws attention to the particular challenges that urban spaces face and the practices and opportunities that exist in these spaces in relation to improving or enhancing water security.

Whilst the category of “urban” may imply a clear distinction between this and a “rural” form of water security, this understanding is misleading as clear-cut distinctions between rural and urban areas rarely exist. As Wratten [24] suggested, it is more accurate to view the urban-rural divide as a continuum than as a rigid dichotomy as rapid urbanization may lead to the expansion of peri-urban areas which share both rural and urban attributes, institutions and processes [25,26]. Ranganathan & Balazs [27] argue that this hybrid space may be better conceptualized as the “urban fringe”.

Despite these conceptual challenges associated with defining an ‘urban scale’, local assessments on water security at the city/regional scales have proven to be very useful in highlighting sub-national variations in water security and identifying specific challenges and opportunities. According to Hoekstra et al. [16], urban water security differs from the general concept of water security because it is affected in unique ways by other processes such as urbanization, climate change, economic growth or political structures, making it an especially complex and dynamic phenomenon.

Urban water security assessments emerged from an understanding that in order to better comprehend decision-making structures and develop effective adaptation strategies, finer scales of analysis to those of the national or basin level, were required [17,19]. This study defines the urban scale of analysis according to the current administrative boundaries of the city of Ulaanbaatar which includes both urban and peri-urban ger district geographical areas, its inhabitants and consumers of the city’s water resources.

3.1. City profile

Ulaanbaatar is Mongolia’s capital city. The population of Ulaanbaatar is around 1.6 million [28] which represents nearly 50% of the country’s total population [29]. Due to its high altitude (about 1,350 metres above sea level) and continental location, Ulaanbaatar experiences extreme seasonal variations in temperature. The climate is generally classified as semi-arid and the city marks a boundary between humid continental and subarctic climates, with steppe zone to the south and forest-steppe to the north of the city.

The city has experienced particularly rapid urbanization over the past two decades following the transition to a market economy [30,31]. Ulaanbaatar’s population was less than 0.8 million in the year 2000 and over 1.4 million in 2017 [29,32]. During this time, the capital’s population has grown by 70% [33] and ger districts have proliferated in the city’s surroundings. Gers are the traditional nomadic settlements which are shaped as round tents/yurts. Historically, these have been the mobile settlements of nomadic herders but over the past 30 years, there has been a rapid growth of permanent residential ger-districts in the outskirts of the Ulaanbaatar and other Mongolian cities [34]. Ger districts are currently home to one-third of the country’s population [34] and around 60% of Ulaanbaatar’s urban population [35]. Centralized piped water infrastructure does not extend to ger districts in Ulaanbaatar. These areas rely instead on public water kiosks which serve between 900 and 1,200 people each [36] and independent hand-dug wells [37].

3.2. Water resources in Ulaanbaatar

Mongolia as a whole has a relatively high endowment of internal freshwater resources in terms of water availability per capita for the country as a whole [29,38] despite the fact that 90% of its territory is classified as arid to moisture deficient [39]. Nevertheless, the uneven spatial distribution of both surface and groundwater resources coupled with pollution outbreaks associated with mining, other industrial activities and sewage discharges [40], has resulted in the emergence of highly localized water scarcity hotspots [29,41,42].

One of the regions experiencing high water stress is Ulaanbaatar, which Nakayama et al. [42] recently identified as being at severe risk of water insecurity. Ulaanbaatar’s growth and expansion, coupled with increasing water demand and higher risk of water contamination from industrial activities and unregulated sewage discharge makes it a particularly concerning water insecurity hotspot [40].

Ulaanbaatar relies almost exclusively on groundwater aquifers for its water supply [32], which account for approximately 82% of the total water use in the city [41]. The Tuul River flowing through the city is the primary source of recharge to the alluvial aquifer beneath it [28] (Fig 1). The Tuul River Basin experiences the highest water withdrawal rates of all river basins in Mongolia, nearly 100 million m³ per year [29]. The Tuul River basin includes 65.5% of the Ulaanbaatar city area and provides a total of 641 million m³/year of potential exploitable groundwater resources [43].

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Fig 1. Map showing the location of Ulaanbaatar and the Tuul River flowing through the city.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pwat.0000160.g001

Beyond the ongoing challenges around water access and availability, climate change projections are expected to put further stress on these resources. Mongolia has been identified as one of the countries most vulnerable to the impacts of anthropogenic climate change but the effects will be mixed [29]. Climate models predict a gradual increase in precipitation and greater seasonal variability but drought events are also expected to become more frequent and prolonged [29,44]. Surface evaporation in the Tuul River increased by 153 mm between 1961 and 2008 and warm season precipitation decreased by 51mm during the same period [43]. A recent study of the Tuul River’s ecohydrological processes confirmed that groundwater levels have been in decline over the past twenty years [28]. Nakayama et al. [42] estimate that groundwater levels throughout the basin declined by 0.7m on average between 2000 and 2018. However, a much greater decline was observed in Ulaanbaatar where groundwater level declined by 3 – 15m during the same period as a result of rapidly increasing urban water use since the year 2000.

3.3. Institutional landscape of water resource management in Ulaanbaatar

Mongolia’s 2012 Water Law emphasized Mongolia’s a commitment towards IWRM [43,45]. A critical component of this legislation was the strengthening of the River Basin Administrations (RBAs) which are responsible for the management and monitoring of water resources at the basin-scale [29]. There are currently 21 operating RBAs across Mongolia [41]. The RBA responsible for the Tuul River basin is the Tuul River Basin Administration (TRBA). RBAs are supervised by the Ministry of Environment and Tourism and work alongside other local and regional actors such as the municipal Water Supply and Sewerage Authority (USUG).

Both basin and national scale water security assessments have been undertaken recently in Mongolia. The Basin Health Report Card for the Tuul River [23] was the first of its kind in Mongolia. It assesses a range of indicators at the basin level and concludes that the Tuul is the most polluted river in Mongolia. In 2020, the Asian Development Bank conducted a water security evaluation for Mongolia at the national scale. The final report reinforced the unequal distribution of water resources and highlighted Ulaanbaatar as a severe water insecurity hotspot [29]. However, assessments of water security at the urban level are limited [37,46,47]. This study aims to address this data gap by constructing a preliminary urban water security index for Mongolia’s capital city drawing from a range of publicly accessible government data and secondary literature.

4.1. Ethics statement

This research was approved by the University of British Columbia’s Behavioural Research Ethics Board. The author obtained written informed consent by distributing a consent form to all participants that was translated into Mongolian. The translator was then able to answer any questions the participants may have had and make clarifications about the purpose of the research prior to commencing the interviews. Additional information regarding the ethical, cultural, and scientific considerations specific to inclusivity in global research is included in the Supporting Information (S1 Checklist).

4.2. Key informant interviews

Valuable insights on Ulaanbaatar’s water systems and contemporary policies were obtained through in-depth, semi-structured interviews with key informants whose professional experience is directly linked to Ulaanbaatar’s water sector. Participants were recruited using a non-probability, purposeful snowballing sampling method. The criteria for participation was their direct involvement in Ulaanbaatar’s water systems through, for example, decision-making and policy, advocacy or education.

A total of 12 in-depth key informant interviews were undertaken with participants representing a diverse set of backgrounds and experiences (Table 1). These included government officials, representatives of local government agencies, private sector professionals and researchers from the Mongolian Academy of Sciences. The questions focused on the challenges their organization was facing and more broadly their perceptions of water security vulnerability in Ulaanbaatar. The guiding interview questions then touched on the ways participants felt that water security could be improved and what dimensions should be prioritized in order to do so. These last questions were very important given that they highlighted what indicators could be included in future research aiming to develop an index to assess and monitor water security in Ulaanbaatar.

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Table 1. List of organizations included in this study.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pwat.0000160.t001

Most interviews were conducted in English and in the case that participants felt more comfortable speaking in Mongolian, a local translator was employed. The translator, who was fluent in both Mongolian and English, assisted in conveying and interpreting the responses of the participants.

5.1. Data unavailability

The most common recurring theme that emerged from participants being asked about challenges they face whilst working in the water sector in Ulaanbaatar are issues associated with accessing hydrological data. When asked to develop on this challenge, two key issues were raised by the participants.

The first is simply the lack of data given limited funding or measuring tools for this. Not all data is equally accessible to all stakeholders. The River Basin Authority, for example, still needs to buy climate data from the state central meteorological database. Given already tight budget constraints, the Authority is unable to regularly access the most updated information. In terms of water quality data, the representative from the WB Water Group explicitly mentioned how, despite attempts, there are still no automatic surface water quality monitors across the Tuul due to limited financial resources for this. This monitoring mechanisms would allow decision-makers and city planners to identify the sources of pollution and where this is being discharged into the river. At the moment, periodic water quality assessments are not accurate enough to identify this and hence design adequate policy interventions.

The second issue raised by participants in relation to data was that some existing data are not being made publicly available due to national security concerns. Water is considered to be a strategic resource and water laws are embedded in Mongolia’s national security strategies so some information, especially on groundwater wells, is highly classified. The lack of open information about data availability creates several challenges. First, it restricts the ability of researchers and advocacy groups to raise awareness on water security issues. Secondly, it creates uncertainty and reduces transparency around water scarcity and future projection on groundwater availability. Thirdly, it creates confusion within agencies as to what can be made publicly accessible or shared with other institutions.

5.2. Limited financial resources

Linked to the issue of data availability but affecting a broad range of stakeholders and operations is the recurring concern of ever more limited financial resources for the public sector institutions working with water.

This has become a particularly pertinent challenge following the Covid-19 pandemic as GDP growth slowed down but the cost of providing water services to the city’s population increased, as a country-wide policy to temporarily suspend consumer tariffs for services such as water was put into place. Representatives from USUG highlighted that they consistently operate at a financial loss. They explained this is because the domestic provision of water is very expensive but consumer water tariffs are heavily subsidized by the government. This leads to municipal authorities collecting very little revenue for their day to day operations. On top of this, the temporary suspension of tariffs during the pandemic put further strain on the organization. A government official who used to work in the Ministry of Environment and Tourism emphasizes that this is not an isolated case, there has traditionally been a lack on investment in the water sector in Ulaanbaatar. The general lack of funding and high cost of water supply infrastructure and maintenance have been consistently flagged amongst local water experts as the main reasons why economic water security is of high concern in Mongolia’s capital.

5.3. Intensifying flood risk

As for water-related disasters, flooding is a major issue in Ulaanbaatar, particularly during the summer months between June and August when 90% of annual rainfall is received in the Tuul River Basin [28]. Participants agreed that flood risk is exacerbated by poor urban planning which has only deteriorated over the years as more construction is taking place immediately adjacent to the river.

According to Article 22.2 in the 2012 Law of Mongolia on Water [48], special protected zones should be established at least 50 meters from the river banks and no construction in this area should be allowed. However, construction in Ulaanbaatar over past few years has not respected this law and buildings are still being constructed adjacent to the river. One participant highlighted that this is an illegal practice and suggested that corruption of local officials by the powerful construction companies is most likely taking place. Additionally, rapid and unplanned construction has led to a significant reduction in green space which exacerbates the risk of flash floods during storms. These urbanization trends are ongoing and so participants suggested that the expected trend is even greater flood risk in the near future.

In fact, at the time of writing the first draft of this paper, the author witnessed the severe flooding that took place in Ulaanbaatar after heavy rain fell in the city on July 1^st. On July 8^th, the Tuul River reached a depth of 288cm, 28 cm above the dangerous flood level [49]. Local news articles pointed highlighted the severity of this flood and notes that it resulted in the complete flooding of seven locations along the river which have temporarily lost access to electricity affecting a total of around 128,000 citizens directly [50]. These events reinvigorated the discussion around flood preparedness and mitigation in the city but much of the policy implementation on this issue is still limited.

5.4. Water marginality in ger districts

All participants noted that significant inequalities in water supply and quality persist between areas with apartment buildings supplied by the central water pipeline and ger district households that rely on hand-dug wells and public water ‘kiosks’, small distribution centres where water stored in a large tank is used to fill up people’s private containers, for their water supply (Fig 2) [51]. The lack of water infrastructure and poor water quality compared to other areas of the city leads to what can be described as a state of ‘water marginality’ [12,27] in ger districts. This idea refers to an involuntary position and condition in which water infrastructure is limited and investment is prioritized elsewhere.

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Fig 2. Photograph of an automated water kiosk located in a ger area in the northeast of the city of Ulaanbaatar.

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The disparity in terms of water supply between apartments and ger areas is captured by the fact that only approximately 60% of Ulaanbaatar’s population is connected to the centralized water supply [40]. Water consumption in the ger districts is also lower and residences pay more per liter due to the high maintenance costs of the water kiosks. On average, a ger district resident in Ulaanbaatar uses 7.3 l liters of water per day which is much lower than the average for apartment residents, 291 liters/day [35].

Significant differences between apartment buildings and ger areas also exist in terms of water quality. The unplanned expansion of Ulaanbaatar’s ger districts has increased the risk of water contamination due to the lack of appropriate sanitation and sewage systems [37]. Residents in these areas rely on open-pit latrines which directly discharge untreated sewage into the soil [40]. The sewage discharge percolates through the soil and contaminates the local groundwater which then may flow downwards toward the river, expanding the region impacted [37]. Nevertheless, a noticeable difference in nitrates levels exists between the central supply alluvial aquifer where nitrates level is 1.7mg/L versus 101.3 mg/L in ger district areas [37].

A chemist at USUG’s central Quality Laboratory explained that there is a lack of public awareness on this issue. She suggested this is due to the ongoing misconception that groundwater is separate from surface water and so it remains clean. Furthermore, she stresses that there is a lack of reliable data on groundwater quality in ger districts as this lies beyond USUG’s jurisdiction.

There are, however, plans to improve water quality and supply to ger areas. A noticeable example is Mongolia’s flagship Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) project to improve Ulaanbaatar’s water systems [52]. One of the projects involves automating kiosks to make water available any time to residents and reduce the operating costs of delivering water via truck to these kiosks. Furthermore, USUG has ongoing projects to connect kiosks to the central water pipeline. However, the infrastructure for this is very costly and they may face land ownership challenges if residents don’t agree for the construction work to go ahead in their plots. So, whilst projects to improve water security in ger areas are necessary and indeed underway, ongoing challenges to implement these fully results in an ongoing state of water marginality for communities living in the urban fringe.

5.5. Good policy but poor implementation

Another recurring theme throughout the interviews concerned the contrast between water policy and regulation on paper against everyday implementation challenges. Mongolia’s water laws, policies and regulations follow international best practices and standards closely. However, challenges arise when it comes to implementing and enforcing these high standards. Three main issues were identified by participants as limiting the different institutions from effective policy implementation and enforcement. These are lack of funding, lack of human resources and institutional fragmentation.

For example, one of the variables used in the index is the implementation of the IWRM plan. The Tuul River Basin Authority is an implementing agency whose main role is to design, implement and evaluate the IWRM plan. The latest phase of the Tuul River’s IWRM plan was completed in 2021 and an extensive internal review of the process has taken place adhering to the UN’s best practices on the process. However, the acting head of Water Management and Planning Division of the organization flagged during our interview that the institution lacks significant funding and human resources. She mentioned that they do not currently have a budget to undertake the activities laid out in the IWRM plan which were not completed by 2021, and that obtaining the financial support from the local government can be challenging. She also pointed out how the lack of funding and investment in the water sector is affecting their ability to employ skilled professionals. “You can see there are a lot of tables in here but I’m alone, we are supposed to have five people in the division but currently I’m the only person working in here…” says as she points around the empty room.

Furthermore, representatives of the Basin Authority, USUG, MCA and the WB in Ulaanbaatar all stressed that challenges arise due to the high degree of institutional fragmentation in the water sector. Water is an issue that cuts across sectors, institutions and spatial scales [7]. Although water policy generally falls under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Environment and Tourism up to 10 different ministries may become involved at the same time for any single water related project. On top of this, there are different local implementing agencies that have different responsibilities, work on different timescales and budgets. This institutional fragmentation leads to lengthy and, at times, uncoordinated implementation. For example, an employee of the MCA noted that delays in their projects often had to do with the project’s approval process. For an activity to get approved it first need to be reviewed by two or three different ministries and once this process is complete it then needs to pass a special committee with other members of government.

Overall, participants agreed that advances in policy coherence through better inter-agency communication could greatly improve policy implementation. Simultaneously, they noted that funding would also be crucial to ensure that policy is effective not only on paper but in practice too.

5.6. Directions for future research

This paper has provided an overview of urban water security challenges in Ulaanbaatar. It has identified that core concerns for key water stakeholders revolve around data unavailability, limited financial and human resources, an increasing risk of flooding, ongoing water marginality in ger areas and the gap between policy design and effective implementation.

These findings can be used as a benchmark of indicators that should be incorporated into future assessments of water security. A potential avenue would be to attempt to develop an urban water security index which reflects these dimensions and incorporated primary data that can be collected on a regular basis. A diverse range of tools and frameworks have emerged over the past decades which attempt to operationalize the concept of water security. These assessments are based on the selection and categorisation of a set of indicators to create an operational water security index based on a weighted aggregate score from these indicators [19,53–55]. Another tool for assess urban water security in Ulaanbaatar drawing from this study’s findings could be the recently developed WATSAT tool [56] which enables city-planners and decision-making authorities to independently evaluate the water security situation in their city.

This study has identified potential avenues to collecting the primary data required to build this index. For example, the implementation of automatic surface water quality monitors across the Tuul, as suggested by a hydrochemist at the Mongolian Academy of Sciences, would allow academic and policy-makers to track changes in different pollutants over time and space along the river could then be used as variables for the water quality dimension of a water security index. Future assessments of water security could attempt to capture through proxies other key challenges outlined in this study such as that of institutional fragmentation or flood-risk factor.

The key challenges identified in this study may also be used to assign different weightings to different dimensions of water security. Given that flood risk is an increasing concern this may receive a higher weighting, for example, that indicators related to water governance, which participants have agreed is generally quite robust in Ulaanbaatar.