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Khatanbaatar Myagmarsuren: Contributing to the mining industry in Mongolia

Posted: 28 June 2022

Khatanbaatar Myagmarsuren, an Australia Awards alumnus from Mongolia, has more than 10 years of mining engineering experience in both opencut and underground mines, working in Mongolia, China, Indonesia and Australia.

Khatanbaatar holds a Bachelor of Mining Management from Mongolian University of Science and Technology and completed a Master of Financial Management at Mongolia’s University of Finance and Economics. To further advance his skills and knowledge, he went on to complete a Master of Mining Engineering at the University of New South Wales in 2018, through the support of an Australia Awards Scholarship.

While in Australia, Khatanbaatar received the opportunity to work on a gold and copper mining project at the Telfer Gold Mine in Western Australia as a project engineer with Macmahon Holdings Limited. During his time there, he was able to experience short-term mine planning work and learnt the general process of how a production plan is completed—from initial planning, through development, to completion at the mining site. He also gained experience in managing different support activities and learnt how important they were in relation to the main project work.

“Being a member of the engineering team at the Telfer Gold Mine was a valuable experience for me and an excellent opportunity to develop my skills,” he says. “We, as a team, shared our skills and experiences with each other, while also working with internationally competent engineers, which increased the efficiency of the project.”

Since his return from Australia, Khatanbaatar has been working as the Chief Executive Officer at Titanobel Mongolia LLC, a French-Mongolian joint venture, which produces and trades industrial explosives in the Mongolian mining market. Based on the professional knowledge and experiences he gained from Australia, he has been developing the venture’s corporate governance and an integrated working system for ANFO (ammonium nitrate/fuel oil, a widely used bulk industrial explosive) and emulsion-type explosives with his management team. In addition, he has been working with the Mongolian Ministry of Mining, advising the Technical Working Group on the Oyu Tolgoi project.

“I have introduced an integrated working process to the company culture based on my knowledge of engineering skills, which means that from factory technicians to engineering level workers, all understand the importance of their work at the management level, which in return impacts their professional capabilities,” Khatanbaatar says. “For example, they can now produce daily and weekly production reports themselves and their KPIs [key performance indicators] can be measured and managed efficiently. The integrated working process has supported engineers and technicians in using professional software to plan their production and compare it to their performance from time to time to improve productivity.”

Khatanbaatar believes such integrated working processes can have a positive effect on corporate governance, which can improve working efficiency in organisations, thereby contributing to Mongolia’s further development.

He is very thankful for his Australia Awards experience and the many benefits that the program offers.

“The Australia Awards Scholarship program for developing countries has the advantage of providing a wide range of opportunities for young people seeking to advance in their careers. The fact that your spouse and children can also study and work in Australia while you are completing your master’s degree makes the program even more valuable,” he says.

Khatanbaatar firmly encourages others to apply for the Scholarship, noting that the outcomes are multi-faceted: “Applying your education experience to your country’s development will also contribute to your confidence in your career and allow your skills to be fully utilised when you are back in your home country. I strongly recommend others apply for an Australia Awards Scholarship if they get a chance.”