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Abstract

Cold-season disasters (dzud) increasingly threaten pastoralism in the eastern Eurasian drylands, notably Mongolia, killing millions of livestock and jeopardizing the sustainability of one of the remaining significant systems of mobile pastoralism worldwide. Despite escalating climate and socioeconomic pressures, integrated prospective assessments coupling climate hazards, rangeland dynamics, and socioeconomic vulnerability remain lacking. Here we develop a climate–rangeland–society modelling framework to assess ecological and socioeconomic sustainability. The framework projects dzud risk through 2050 under three climatic scenarios Representative Concentration Pathways and Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSP1–2.6, SSP3–7.0, and SSP5–8.5) and six socioeconomic pathways—business-as-usual, SSP-aligned trends, and long-term development vision—each includes an export-enhanced variant. Across baseline pathways, dzud risk is projected to intensify from the mid-2030s, with annual livestock mortality reaching 8–11 million head (sheep units), driven by compounding climate hazards and increased vulnerability, particularly persistent overstocking that exceeds rangeland carrying capacity. Although hay preparedness increases modestly, persistent overstocking erodes per-animal hay availability and induces nutritional stress. By contrast, export-enhanced pathways reduce dzud mortality by 63–91%—preventing up to 9.5 million deaths annually—by alleviating grazing pressure while sustaining meat revenues, demonstrating that ecological and socioeconomic sustainability are mutually reinforcing. Achieving this requires coordinated investment in veterinary services, cold-chain logistics, and market governance, alongside regulatory frameworks that align herder incentives with ecological sustainability.