NLP and Artificial Intelligence in the Development of the Mongolian Language

In 1999, UNESCO proclaimed February 21 as International Mother Language Day. Since then, the day has been observed in many countries around the world.

The origins of International Mother Language Day date back to 1952, when people in Bangladesh fought to preserve their mother tongue, Bangla, also known as Bengali. February 21 is commemorated as Language Martyrs’ Day in Bangladesh, inspiring the establishment of International Mother Language Day.

UNESCO emphasizes the importance of mother-tongue-based education from early childhood, recognizing it as a fundamental foundation for learning. International research indicates that approximately 43% of the world’s 6,000 languages are at risk of extinction. Preserving cultural diversity requires every nation to continue speaking, using, and passing its mother tongue on to future generations.

International Mother Language Day is observed worldwide to celebrate cultural diversity, protect the world’s languages, and promote their continued use and development.

As our lives become increasingly digital, the use of languages in digital environments plays a growing role in preserving and enriching them. However, fewer than 100 languages dominate internet usage. Mongolian is considered a low-resource language, meaning that it has relatively limited digital presence and linguistic resources. Consequently, there is insufficient data to develop modern technologies such as Natural Language Processing (NLP), machine learning, and machine understanding to their full potential.

Factors including population size, educational access, and economic conditions contribute to the limited amount of digital data available in Mongolian. As a result, Mongolia, along with other nations whose languages have limited digital resources, faces the risk of falling behind in technological advancement and having fewer opportunities to benefit from global economic growth.

To address this challenge, Chimege Systems was established in 2019 to develop technologies that convert Mongolian speech into text and text into speech, bringing these solutions to market. The company continues to advance foundational artificial intelligence technologies, including natural language understanding and machine translation.

We believe that the technologies we develop will empower future generations to use their mother tongue freely and effectively in the digital world, while keeping pace with global technological progress and preserving their language, culture, and identity.

Our mission is to ensure that the Mongolian language thrives in the digital age and remains an integral part of the world’s technological future.