At least 10 Mongolian provinces experience djud

At least 10 of all the 21 Mongolian provinces have been experiencing extreme wintry weather, known as "dzud," the country's National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) said Thursday, Xinhua reports.

Dzud is a Mongolian term to describe a severely cold winter when a large number of livestock die because the ground is frozen or covered in snow.

"At least 10 provinces, including Bayan-Ulgii, Uvs, Khovd, Zavkhan and Govi-Altai in the west, as well as Khentii and Dornogovi in the east, are now experiencing the dzud," the NEMA said in a statement.

In addition, eight provinces, including Sukhbaatar in the east and Bulgan in the north, are experiencing near-dzud conditions, the emergency agency said.

In 2016, a dzud killed more than 1 million livestock in Mongolia, a nation where pastoral herding is still common.

The livestock sector is a central pillar of the Mongolian economy. The country's total livestock population stood at 71.1 million at the end of 2022.