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| Mongolia |
| Mongolia is a spacious country of grassland and blue sky, with a population of about 2.4 million spread among 1.6 million square km, resulting in a population density only 1 / 200th that of Japan. The climate is very dry, cool in summer and extremely cold in winter. |
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| Mongolian Agricultural Training Project |
| When Mayor Sataro Narita first visited Mongolia in August of 1990, he initiated a program to help train Mongolians in agricultural techniques and technology. Since 70% of the population of Mongolia is nomadic, living mainly by raising livestock, the quantity of rice, grains, fruits and vegetables grown domestically has long been insufficient to meet the needs of the population. The Mongolian Agricultural Training Project in Shariki was initiated after the Mongolian Ministry of Agriculture requested that Shariki help introduce new crops and agricultural technology to Mongolia. In the 7 years since the program's inception, a total of 45 trainees have come to Shariki. With the goal of helping to advance the state of agriculture in Mongolia, trainees live in Shariki for about six months and study a variety of subjects including the cultivation of rice, vegetables and other crops, as well as Japanese language and culture. |
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@@ A class at the Center for Agricultural Development |
 Harvesting Rice in Shariki |
| Working together to improve agricultural techniques |
| Since 1991, Shariki has been operating a pilot farm in Mongolia to experiment with the cultivation of various crops and enable returning trainees to put the skills they learned in Shariki to good use. For the first two years of its existence, the disappointing results yielded by this farm seemed to confirm the long-standing and widely held belief that Mongolia's climate made rice cultivation impossible. However, after the pilot farm was moved to a more favorable location in 1993, it enabled Mongolia, for the first time in its history, to produce a rice harvest. Since then, the volume of the harvest has been increasing every year. Thanks in part to the support that the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) has been providing since 1995, experts have also been dispatched to Mongolia to work with Mongolian farmers for longer periods. @ |
 Badanduvjid(a trainee) with some of the first stalks of rice ever grown in Mongolia |
 Pilot Farm in Choibalsan, Mongolia |
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| Learning from each other! |
 Exchanging ideas with the students of Shariki Junior High School |
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| Teaching the locals how to make 'buuz', Mongolian steamed meat dumplings |
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| Mongolian sumo wrestlers Kyokutenzan, Kyokutenho and Kyokushuzan pay a visit to their compatriots. |
| Aomori Prefecture Nishi-Tsugaru-gun Shariki
Village Shariki Hanabayashi 65 TEL 0173-56-2111@FAX 0173-56-3777 E-mail address shariki01@net.pref.aomori.jp |
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