Since joining UNFPA Mongolia as Head of Office in March 2022, Dr. Khalid Sharifi has worked alongside the Government of Mongolia, health professionals, young people, civil society, development partners and communities. During this period, UNFPA’s work evolved from individual projects and services toward strengthening systems that can continue delivering results long after a particular project or funding cycle ends.

The conversation ranges from maternal and reproductive health and rural midwifery to gender-based violence, youth participation and the use of data in public policy. At its centre is a broader question: how can development cooperation help build national systems that endure beyond individual projects and funding cycles?

You have been leading UNFPA Mongolia through a period of significant change. Looking back, what stands out most to you?

When I look back, I don’t think first about the number of projects we implemented or the activities we completed. I think about whether those efforts changed something that will continue to make a difference in people’s lives.

One of the biggest changes I have seen is the shift from stand-alone projects toward stronger national systems. We wanted the capacities UNFPA helped develop to become part of Mongolia’s own institutions, policies and professional practice—not parallel structures that depend indefinitely on external support.

For me, that is the real measure of success.

The Open-Heart Surgery Ward at the National Center for Maternal and Child Health, the Family Planning Training Center, the expansion of Maternal and Perinatal Death Surveillance and Response, the Gender Expert Panel, the Student Health Card and the integration of gender-based violence into professional training are examples of this approach. Taken together, they reflect a broader shift across maternal and reproductive health, the response to gender-based violence and youth policy: the aim has increasingly been to embed capacity within Mongolian institutions rather than create standalone UNFPA projects.

These are not simply UNFPA achievements. They reflect leadership by the Government of Mongolia and its institutions, the commitment of Mongolian professionals and communities, and the contributions of development partners. UNFPA’s role has been to support, convene and help strengthen that national effort.

One of the most visible examples is the Open-Heart Surgery Ward. What did that mean to you personally?

For me, the most important part is not the building or the equipment. It is what happens inside that building.

Imagine being a parent and being told that your child needs life-saving heart surgery. For many families, that previously meant facing the possibility of travelling abroad, with enormous financial, emotional and logistical pressure.

Today, more children can receive this life-saving care in Mongolia, closer to their families and support networks.

In June alone, 19 children, including infants as young as one month, received care through the facility. The number matters, but so does what it represents: a child able to receive complex care at home and a family spared at least some of the financial and logistical burden of seeking treatment abroad.

This work was supported through substantial financing from the Government of Luxembourg and led in partnership with Mongolia’s health authorities. What matters most is that Mongolian specialists are strengthening the country’s own capacity to provide this care for Mongolian children in Mongolia. For UNFPA, the broader value is the same principle that guides our core mandate: strengthening health systems and national capacity so essential services are available closer to the people who need them.

Mongolia has substantially reduced maternal mortality for over two decades. Where has UNFPA contributed to that broader national effort?

Every maternal death is a tragedy, but it should also be a moment when a health system asks itself: What can we learn, and what must we change so this does not happen again?

At UNFPA, we believe that every maternal death review must lead to learning, action and stronger health system response. UNFPA helped build the foundations for progress through sustained health-system strengthening, policy and clinical guidance reform, support for contraceptive commodities and family planning, safe motherhood, maternity waiting homes, and competency-based midwifery education. Six rounds of Confidential Enquiry into Maternal Deaths also generated evidence on preventable factors and system gaps, helping shift the national response from counting deaths to understanding and preventing them.

Another important contribution has been telemedicine, which helped bring knowledge and support closer to women and health workers in remote areas. UNFPA supported 22 remote hospitals with teleconferencing technology, which later evolved into a pilot midwife-led teleconsultation network using digital ultrasound and remote specialist support. This has helped reduce the barriers created by Mongolia’s vast geography and connect health workers in rural areas with specialists.

UNFPA supports the strengthening of Maternal and Perinatal Death Surveillance and Response (MPDSR) in line with international guidance. Initially piloted through three committees, the system had expanded by 2025 to 23 of Mongolia’s 26 national facilities, with 43 independent case reviews conducted.

Mongolia has set a very ambitious national goal of reducing maternal mortality to 15 deaths per 100,000 live births by 2030. Reaching that target will require continued national leadership, investment and accountability.

You have spoken about the importance of bringing health services closer to people. Given Mongolia’s vast territory and dispersed population, is it even possible?

Geography should not determine whether someone receives quality healthcare.

Mongolia’s geography presents unique challenges. A woman living in a remote soum should not have fewer choices simply because she lives far from Ulaanbaatar.

That is why midwives are so important. They are often on the front line when roads are blocked, a zud hits or floods occur. They provide essential maternal, sexual and reproductive health services close to communities and can also play an important role in identifying risk and referring survivors of gender-based violence to appropriate services.

This is why UNFPA continues to support stronger midwife-led care. In 2025 alone, 82 midwives were trained to independently provide family planning and adolescent sexual and reproductive health services. But one story illustrates the value of that investment better than the number alone.

A midwife in Zavkhan Province told us that before the training, she could only assist doctors with IUD insertions. After gaining the skills and confidence to provide the service herself, she went on to insert 53 IUDs and 28 contraceptive implants—and then trained another local midwife.

That is what sustainable development looks like in practice: a professional gains the skills and confidence to provide a service locally, and then passes that capacity on to a colleague.

UNFPA has also worked extensively on gender-based violence. What progress have you seen?

Gender-based violence is ultimately about people—their safety, dignity and ability to rebuild their lives.

Mongolia has made important progress toward a more coordinated and institutionalized response to gender-based violence. Survivor-centred services and referral mechanisms have expanded, professional capacity is increasingly being embedded within health, social, police and other sectors, and the legal, policy and coordination framework has strengthened. Prevention and public engagement have also gained greater attention, alongside improved use of data and evidence to guide action.

At the same time, the work is far from complete. Service quality and accessibility remain uneven, sustainable financing and accountability need to be strengthened, harmful social norms require sustained prevention efforts, and emerging forms of violence—particularly technology-facilitated gender-based violence—are creating new challenges.

What is particularly important is that gender-based violence is increasingly being treated as a systemic issue requiring a coordinated response across sectors. One example is the incorporation of gender-based violence content into pre-service curricula for medical students and police cadets. That matters because an effective response depends on professionals understanding survivor-centred and coordinated practice before they enter the workforce.

Campaigns such as the 16 Days of Activism remain important for public awareness and collective engagement, but the more durable work is institutional: strengthening prevention, survivor-centred services, professional capacity, referral systems and accountability across sectors.

The next stage is therefore not simply to establish more mechanisms, but to ensure that existing systems work consistently, are adequately resourced, respond to survivors with dignity and quality, and prevent violence before it occurs.

Young people have been another important part of UNFPA’s work. What have you learned from working with Mongolia’s youth?

Young people don’t want to be treated simply as beneficiaries. They want to be heard, trusted and given the opportunity to shape decisions that affect their lives.

I saw this increasingly clearly during my time in Mongolia.

The Youth Development Centres expanded their reach, digital platforms allowed us to engage large numbers of young people, and the first-ever Youth Situational Analysis has provided evidence for discussions around Mongolia’s National Youth Strategy 2025–2030 and the revision of the Law on Youth Development.

One of the things I have learned is that participation works best when it is substantive. Young people should not simply be invited into a room after decisions have already been made; they need meaningful opportunities to influence the policies and services that affect them.

Despite the progress you have described, what emerging challenges should Mongolia prioritize now?

Progress should not make us complacent. There are areas where gains remain fragile and new challenges are emerging. Adolescent pregnancy remain a concern and requires a response that goes beyond the health sector, including access to accurate information and services, continued education, and an environment in which adolescents can make informed choices about their lives. We also need to respond to evolving forms of gender-based violence, particularly technology-facilitated gender-based violence. Prevention, protection, digital literacy, law enforcement and survivor-centred services all need to keep pace with changes in technology. More broadly, strengthening the enabling environment is essential: policies, financing, institutional mandates, data, professional capacity and accountability need to work together so that progress does not depend on individual projects. And Mongolia will need to plan proactively for changing population dynamics and strengthen resilience so that national and local systems can continue reaching people as demographic and other pressures evolve. For me, these are priorities for the next phase: not only expanding services, but strengthening the systems and conditions that allow people to exercise their rights and access support wherever they live.

Partnerships seem to have played a major role in the results achieved during your tenure. What makes a partnership successful?

No single organization can solve Mongolia’s development challenges alone.

Our role has often been to bring people around the same table and ask: What can we achieve together that none of us could achieve alone? We have been fortunate to work with a diverse group of partners. The Government of Luxembourg has been an important long-term partner, including in health-system investments and the Neonatal Open-Heart Surgery Ward. The European Union has supported important work on gender equality and strengthening the gender expertise and digital gender literacy, while Switzerland, Australia, the Joint SDG Fund and Oyu Tolgoi have contributed to programmes across different areas of our work.

We have also deliberately widened the circle beyond traditional development partners. Our partnership with Unitel helped expand digital access and engagement with young people, while collaboration with Anungoo LLC and the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China supported menstrual health education and access to sanitary products for girls living in dormitories across selected soums in rural Mongolia. For me, however, a successful  partnership is not defined only by the resources it brings. It is one in which national priorities lead, partners bring complementary strengths, results are measurable, and the capacity created through that cooperation can continue beyond a particular project or funding cycle.

Development cooperation is changing. Government, civil society, the private sector, international partners and communities all have something important to contribute. The real value of partnership is when those contributions come together around a shared objective and help strengthen a coherent, nationally owned system.

Development organizations often talk about sustainability. How do you know these gains will continue once donor funding ends?

There is no automatic guarantee. Sustainability has to be designed and financed. We look for concrete signs: whether a function has been incorporated into policy or professional standards, whether national institutions have staff and budget responsibility, whether training is embedded in pre-service education rather than repeated as an external project, and whether data are routinely used to manage performance. The strongest result is not a project that continues under a different donor; it is a function that Mongolia can own, finance, adapt and improve itself.

Data has also been a recurring theme in UNFPA’s work. Why does data matter so much?

Data matters because without reliable evidence, decisions can too easily be based on assumptions rather than on what people and communities actually need.

During my tenure, UNFPA has supported a range of evidence-generation initiatives, including the Youth Situational Analysis, the Gobi Region Population Analysis and analysis related to gender-based violence. We are also supporting several important ongoing initiatives, including updated population projections, a Demographic Resilience Review, and the initiation of Mongolia’s first National Transfer Accounts exercise. These initiatives are important because Mongolia is experiencing significant demographic and socioeconomic change. Population projections can help anticipate how the size, age structure and geographic distribution of the population may evolve. The Demographic Resilience Review can help identify how policies, institutions and systems need to adapt to those changes, while National Transfer Accounts can provide a clearer understanding of how resources are produced, consumed and shared across generations.

But producing data is not the end goal. The real test is whether evidence informs policy, shapes budgets, improves services and helps the country prepare for future demographic shifts and shocks. When data are connected to decision-making in that way, they become a practical tool for strengthening resilience and ensuring that development reaches those who might otherwise be left behind.

What has Mongolia taught you personally?

Working in a country with such a vast geography and a relatively small population makes you understand very quickly that solutions cannot simply be imported. They have to be adapted to the local context and, ultimately, owned by Mongolian institutions and people.

I have also learned that sometimes the most important change is not the most visible one. A new building or piece of equipment is visible. Less visible is the midwife who becomes confident enough to provide a service independently, the institution that changes a protocol after reviewing a maternal death, or the young person whose evidence changes a policy discussion. My time in Mongolia has reinforced for me that those quieter changes are often the ones that last.

Looking back on your time in Mongolia, what would you say to the people and partners you have worked with?

Thank you. Development work is never the work of one organization or one person. Whatever progress we have contributed to has been possible because Mongolian institutions, health professionals, communities, young people, development partners and colleagues across the UN system chose to work together.

I have had the privilege of witnessing many moments when a policy became a service, when a service became a possibility, and when that possibility changed someone’s life.

I am deeply grateful for the opportunity to have worked in Mongolia—and I have confidence in the institutions, professionals and communities carrying this work forward.

There is still much to do. But Mongolia has demonstrated that when evidence, partnership and political commitment come together, meaningful change is possible.

For me, the most important measure of our work is not what carries UNFPA’s name. It is what Mongolian institutions and professionals are able to own, continue, improve and scale over time. That is what moving from projects to systems should ultimately mean.