One thing you might know about Mongolia is that it is the least densely populated country in the world. The reason why is complex, but it owes a lot to the extreme continental climate mentioned above. Mongolia has very little arable land (or land suitable for growing crops). Three-fourths of the land consists of grassy steppe, which support immense herds of grazing livestock. The rest is divided between forests and barren deserts, with a tiny portion used for agriculture. The prehistoric people who lived in what is now Mongolia adapted to this environment. While some agriculture was present, the dominant culture of Mongolia was pastoral nomadism. The nomads of Central Asia were the first to domesticate the horse, which they used to herd livestock from steppe to steppe in search of green pastures. In the ancient world, nomads from Mongolia roamed from what is now Romania and Bulgaria in the west to today’s Manchuria (north-eastern China). Yet, unlike agriculture, nomadism could only support small populations, meaning that Mongolia never developed the population densities of nearby China. Even today, an estimated 25 to 40 percent of people still live as nomadic herders. Much of the sedentary population is urbanised, with the capital Ulaanbaatar comprising around 45% of the nation’s population with a population of 1.3 million.