Mongolia Import Data: $9.25B in 2023, Up 5.78%

Russia Supplies Nearly All of Mongolia's Fuel

Mongolia imported $9.25 billion worth of goods in 2023, up 5.78% from $8.75 billion in 2022. Mineral fuels led every category at 22.91% of the total, worth $2.12 billion. Mongolia has no operating oil refinery of its own, and Russia supplied roughly 97% of the country's petroleum products as of early 2026, with the country's first domestic refinery not expected to open until 2028. That dependency has real consequences when supply tightens. Russia is Mongolia's dominant supplier of gasoline and diesel, and disruptions on the Russian side have pushed Mongolian fuel prices sharply higher, from around $1.00 a liter toward $1.50 to $2.00. A country with almost no other supply option has little room to push back when that happens. It can only wait for shipments to resume or ration what fuel remains until they do.

Vehicles were the second-largest import category at 16.26% ($1.50 billion). Mongolia permits the import of right-hand-drive Japanese used vehicles even though the country drives on the right side of the road, It is a legal quirk that has made secondhand Japanese cars a routine sight on Mongolian streets despite the mismatch. Drivers end up sitting on the wrong side of the vehicle for the direction of traffic. That workaround persists mainly because imported Japanese cars are cheaper and more available than left-hand-drive alternatives. Machinery contributed 12.48% ($1.15 billion), largely heavy equipment feeding the mining sector that dominates Mongolia's export economy on the other side of the ledger. Electrical machinery added 6.56% ($606.51 million), and iron and steel articles supplied 5.55% ($513.07 million). Iron and steel itself contributed 2.92% ($270.02 million), and plastics added 2.06% ($190.62 million). Rubber products supplied 1.83% ($169.04 million), pharmaceutical products contributed 1.82% ($168.26 million), and miscellaneous edible preparations closed out the top ten at 1.60% ($147.86 million).

China Supplies Four in Ten Dollars, Russia a Quarter More

China supplied 40.53% of Mongolia's imports in 2023, worth $3.75 billion, more than any other country. Russia followed at 25.79% ($2.39 billion). Together, these two neighbors supplied close to two out of every three dollars Mongolia spent on imports, a concentration that mirrors the country's landlocked position between them, even if the split looks very different from the export side. China buys the overwhelming majority of what Mongolia sells abroad, but Russia supplies a far larger share of what Mongolia buys than it does on the export side, largely because of that fuel relationship. The two neighbors effectively split roles. One absorbs almost everything Mongolia digs out of the ground. The other keeps the country's vehicles and generators running. Neither role is easily replaced by a third country. Both trades depend on physical pipelines, rail lines and land border crossings rather than flexible seaborne shipping.

Japan supplied 7.74% ($716.32 million), and South Korea added 4.49% ($415.16 million), both significant sources of used vehicles and machinery parts. The USA contributed 3.05% ($282.36 million), and Germany added 2.28% ($211.31 million). Vietnam supplied 1.24% ($114.81 million), and Turkey contributed 1.04% ($95.91 million). Poland added 1.02% ($94.38 million), and France rounded out the top ten at 1.01% ($93.42 million). None of these smaller sources comes close to challenging the two-country concentration that defines Mongolia's import bill.

Imports Have Grown Steadily, With One Pandemic Dip

Import values dropped only once during the pandemic before climbing steadily every single year since. The total stood at $6.13 billion in 2019, fell to $5.30 billion in 2020 as COVID-era disruptions hit trade, then recovered to $6.84 billion in 2021. It climbed further to $8.75 billion in 2022 and $9.25 billion in 2023.

That steady growth broadly tracks the same mining investment cycle already visible on Mongolia's export side. More machinery and equipment flowing in to expand copper and coal production output tends to show up alongside rising export volumes a year or two later. The bigger vulnerability sits with fuel rather than machinery. A country that depends on a single neighbor for nearly all of its refined petroleum has limited room to absorb a supply shock, and Mongolia's new refinery project will not change that picture until it actually starts producing years from now. Until then, every price spike or supply interruption inside Russia's own fuel market will keep showing up at Mongolian pumps almost immediately, with no domestic buffer standing in between.