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Politics

Mongolia’s committees close the budget revision and push the deficit cap back to 2%

Mongolia’s Budget Standing Committee finished the fourth discussion of the 2026 budget revision on Tuesday and sent it to the plenary, the parliament’s press office said, while a joint session with the Economic Standing Committee backed, by 71.2% of those present, a proposal to keep the deficit cap in the Fiscal Stability Law at 2% of GDP against the 3% in the government’s bill.

By CAW Staff6 October 2026
A glass measuring jug filled with amber liquid up to its marked line, a single drop on the spout.

The committee opened with 17 of its 30 members, 56.7%, and took two items: the fourth discussion of the four revision bills the government submitted on 20 August, for the state budget and the budgets of the National Wealth Fund, the social insurance fund and the health insurance fund, and the final discussion of the laws and resolutions submitted with them. Committee chair N. Naranbaatar will present its report to the plenary, and the page gives no plenary date. The fourth discussion is done, and the chamber now owns the bill.

The accompanying package rewords the National Wealth Fund law so that a share of the dividends the state is owed by state-owned and state-participating companies in mining and mineral processing goes to the fund and the remainder into the state budget as dividend income, with no share and no sum on the page. Members present backed the working group’s version of the package by 88.9% after 83.3% voted to reopen it, and no member spoke on the final draft.

The fourth discussion is done, and the chamber now owns the bill.

At the joint session, with 57.1% attendance, MPs L. Sorongzonbold and B. Jargalan argued that the bill’s change of clause 6.1.2, which sets the deficit’s share of GDP, to 3% should be reduced, and the Fiscal Stability Council’s N. Uuganbaatar said the clause would make fiscal stability harder. A. Ariunzaya answered that 89 of the 116 ratified loan and aid projects are under way, that 95% of an unused loan balance of 14.5 trillion tugrik runs out in 2030 and that a 2% cap leaves the money unusable and losing value. Jargalan’s proposal to make the 3% in clause 6.1.2 read 2% was backed by 71.2% of those present, and the working group’s proposal on clause 6.1.3 by 61.1%.

Behind the fight sits the 2027 draft, which plans a deficit of 2.306 trillion tugrik, 2.0% of GDP, by the National Audit Office’s opinion of 26 September, which also warned that revenue growth leans on mining and on state companies’ dividends. Its largest single such line is the 3 trillion tugrik the government proposes to receive from Oyu Tolgoi in 2027, which the finance minister said on 24 September was written into the budget law as a one-off, with 1 trillion for citizens’ savings accounts and 2 trillion for current spending.

What the ruling party wants passed by 20 October carries the pension and pay rises due on 1 November, and no plenary date for it was on the parliament’s pages by Tuesday evening.

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