The strain of exertion spreads across the little Mongolian boy’s face as he grabs hold of a rope fastened around a slumped cow’s neck, bends his knees and heaves with every muscle in his body to pull the animal to its feet.
Dorjoo, four, furrows his brow as he exclaims: “I can do this!” The determined focus in his eyes shows a glint of the optimism needed to survive this year’s bitter, brutal winter in the sweeping wilds of the Mongolian steppe.
But the cow, its ribs visible under its matted brown fur, is too feeble to stand up from the frozen soil where its legs buckled moments earlier.
Lying metres from a horrifying pile of decomposing animal carcasses, its own expression displays exhaustion and a weary embrace of impending death.
The sight of dead and dying animals has become tragically familiar in Mongolia this year as the East Asian nation has fallen into the grip of a slow-onset weather disaster known as the “dzud”.
About 90 per cent of the country has been impacted by the phenomenon – a deadly mix of perishing temperatures as low as -50C, icy winds and layers of heavy snow that have weakened livestock and frozen pasturelands, killing between four to six million cows, sheep, goats and horses since last November.
Officials say this year’s dzud is the worst in decades. Scientists attribute the catastrophe to a mixture of overgrazing and global climate change.
As we drive off-road across the icy plain that separates Dorjoo’s circular family tent, or “ger”, from the nearest town of Baruun Urt in eastern Mongolia, snow crystals glitter magically as far as the eye can see. The bleak beauty of the vast frozen tundra is overwhelming.
But as our eyes become accustomed to the scale of the place, new and grisly details emerge. Hooves, horns, ribs and hides litter the landscape. Close up, the glassy, dead eyes of frozen animals stare out from snow drifts, testament to the terrible tragedy unfolding here.
Many isolated farming communities are already on the brink but millions more animals are expected to perish before the weather breaks towards the end of April, says Sainbuyan Amarsaikhan, the country’s deputy prime minister. “The loss could reach up to 15 million this year. We still have long days ahead”.
Agriculture and animal husbandry is one of the landlocked country’s economic pillars and last year, the national herd of 64.9 million animals drove record exports of lamb and beef to China and the Middle East.
But the outlook is bleak for 2024. The decimation this winter is projected to cost the national budget $350 million, said Mr Sainbuyan. It also signals financial devastation for the country’s 190,000 herders, some 141,000 of whom now face crippling debts.
“When they lose their livestock that means they have lost their job. They have no income and nothing to cover their expenses,” said Mr Sainbuyan. “Some of them worked and spent tens of years raising their livestock..Everything is lost. It has a big impact on them.”
The government has provided hay and fodder, groceries and fuel to the worst affected communities. It has delayed loan repayments until next year, and nearby countries like China and South Korea, as well as United Nations agencies and charities, including Save the Children, have offered aid.
But no amount of money can ease the grief of herders as they struggle to keep their treasured animals alive and watch helplessly as many die.
“Sometimes the animals cry, and when they cry, I cry too,” said Undrakh Zav, 60, a cow nuzzling her hand, pleading for nutrition. “If they could talk, they would be asking us, ‘do you have food’?”
When the snows hit, Ms Zav rushed from her job as a chef in a fastfood bar in the capital Ulaanbaatar to help her younger brother Munkzhul, 50, fight to save the family’s livestock.
The siblings’ white canvas ger, supported inside by ornately decorated orange beams and warmed by a black iron stove, sits next door to Dorjoo and his 38-year-old mother’s home.
The neighbours have drawn together to survive, pooling resources and taking turns to hack ice from the mouth of a freshwater well.
But despite their best efforts, traversing treacherous terrain to fetch costly hay and fodder or hand-feeding struggling animals with warm fish oil, they have lost hundreds of sheep and goats and dozens of cows.
As Ms Zav spoke to The Telegraph in the biting cold, her neighbour released the remaining sheep huddling in their pen to let them forage the snow-covered hills for sparse vegetation. As they exited, four more dead ewes were revealed, lying still on the frozen ground.
“They’re all pregnant. It’s common for this to happen. They were supposed to give birth in a week but they are too weak to carry [the lambs],” she said.
Another sheep staggered and fell to the ground and she grappled to pick it up. It stumbled slowly forward before giving up again. An hour later, cows pulled at the still breathing animal’s coat, trying to eat its wool, before Ms Zav shooed them away.
“I’ve never experienced such tough weather and thick, solid snow,” she said, before wondering aloud whether what was left of the herd would survive the muddy gloop of the coming thaw. Anxiety about the family’s future seldom left her, she said.
“My brother keeps telling me ‘don’t be sad, don’t be upset, the worst is yet to come’,” she said. “I really don’t want to say what could happen to us. I guess we will try our best to raise what is left.”
Inside the ger, Munkzhul was stoic but honest about his struggles. At the height of the snowfall, it took him two days to travel the 12km to Baruun Urt for fodder. “It’s hard to continue as a herder,” he said of his profession of 20 years. “I think about moving to the city forever.”
As Ms Zav and Dorjoo’s mother headed back to the sheep pen to shift the carcasses to the grim, growing mound of dead animals on the edge of the pasture, the little boy ran between them with boundless energy.
Unfazed by the motionless animals, he stopped to hug one. His elder sister, Urgaa, seven, proudly helped to pull the ewes from the enclosure on a blue, plastic sleigh.
The children seem resilient beyond their years, inured to death in the harsh environment where they have grown up.
But many herders’ children were experiencing terrible stress during the crisis, said Bayan-Altai Luvsandorj, country manager at Save the Children.
“Losing their livestock is like losing a pet, so it’s very close to their heart,” he said.
Many school age children boarding in towns near the steppe had also been separated from their families by the severe weather that had blocked many routes home.
“There is a lot of mental pressure. You are constantly worrying about your family because your parents will be struggling and trying to save the livestock,” he said.
Save the Children has joined efforts to supply fodder and cash to suffering herders, as well as mental health support for the families, but needs outstripped supply, said Mr Bayan-Altai.
Rotting carcasses had to be safely removed before bacteria became a health hazard, and herds had to be restocked.
Mongolia, a country about six times the size of the UK but with just 3.4 million people, is on the frontline of the global climate crisis, which is reshaping its winter season to cause more extreme conditions.
According to an article published by the Yale School of Environment, one factor may be the weakening of the polar jet stream, a fast-flowing wind circling the earth, which is formed by the collision of Arctic air with warmer air to the south.
The warming of the Arctic is weakening the jet stream, allowing more frigid polar air to strike Mongolia.
Dzuds, previously a once in a decade event, are also occurring more frequently.
Between 2000 and 2016, extreme cold hit Mongolia 28 per cent more often than it did from 1981 to 1999, found a 2020 study in the Royal Meteorological Society’s International Journal of Climatology.
If the world stays on track for around 2 degrees C of warming, dzuds are projected to strike up to 20 per cent more often by 2080, said the Yale report.
“When we think about climate change, usually we think about sea levels rising or droughts or floods but we don’t really think about very extreme cold winters,” said Bolormaa Enkhbat, a climate change finance expert and governor of western Khovd province.
“In the case of dzud you have households, herders who didn’t save more than 50 per cent of their herds. That is 50 per cent of one’s assets. It is the same as if your bank account is being emptied for no reason due to climate change.”
Although Mongolia was responsible for less than 0.1 per cent of global emissions, it was one of the “hardest hit,” she said, adding that while humanitarian aid was welcome, a sustainable long-term solution was needed.
“This isn’t just a matter of money. This is a concerted effort that needs not just the international community. We need to think about it from a Mongolian perspective because this is a traditional herding lifestyle. … Our cultural heritage is at risk.”
Despite the hardships, the peace of the open steppe and the satisfaction of living off the land spurs some families to keep going.
Narantsetseg Erdenetuya, a mother of four, has lost 400 goats and sheep and 75 of her 100 cows in recent months but she cannot imagine another lifestyle.
“I hope that when the snow melts away we can make it,” she said.
Ms Narantsetseg said she was encouraging her son to study veterinary medicine to look after the herd in future. “I am going to raise my animals until I get old,” she said.
Sukhbaatar Governor Iderbat Manlaibaatar is still counting the cost of the severe winter that has so far snatched 1.3 million of the province’s 3.8m livestock.
“It felt like we were living in the Arctic,” he said in his Baruun Urt office. “We couldn’t reach some herder families for a month.”
Mr Iderbat fears the economic hit will take its toll for the next three to four years.
“It is more than dzud, it is a natural catastrophe,” he said. “The heavy snow fell because of global warming but there are some internal factors,” he added, pointing towards overgrazing in an area normally known for its abundant vegetation.
Beyond immediate financial relief for herders, Mr Iderbat is working with the central government to find longer term fixes by combining modern and nomadic farming techniques and better preparing for future disasters.
Back in their family ger, Munkzhul and Undrakh Zar are taking one day at a time.
News of a coming storm caused a brief flash of despair for Munkzhul. “It’s too much!” he exclaimed.
But there is no choice but to carry on.
Munkzhul had spotted a dying horse nearby. It was not the family’s own animal but they donned heavy gloves, grabbed a line of rope and piled into their mud-streaked Toyota Corolla.
Slipping and sliding along a path of frozen tire tracks, they found the horse flopped forlornly in deep snow.
For ten minutes they hauled and cajoled the animal back onto its feet and it slowly took some wobbly steps towards thawing stumps of grass.
Munkzhul started back towards the car, his job done, but taking a moment to appreciate the brief window of hope in a long, testing winter.
“I think it will survive,” he said.
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