ULAN BATOR, April 8 (Xinhua) -- Mongolia's central bank on Monday launched a campaign to encourage gold miners and individuals to sell gold to banks.

"The Bank of Mongolia's gold purchase has declined sharply since the beginning of this year due to instability in the domestic tax environment. So, we decided to again launch a campaign called 'National Gold to the Fund of Treasures' to increase the central bank's gold purchase," Atarbaatar Enkhjin, head of the Reserve Management and Financial Markets Department at the Bank of Mongolia, said at the campaign's launch ceremony.

During the six-month campaign, the Bank of Mongolia is planning to organize activities directed at encouraging gold miners and individuals to sell gold to banks, said Enkhjin.

The Mongolian central bank purchased only 12.7 tons of gold in 2014. Thanks to the low royalty taxes on gold with the 2014 amendments, the central bank's annual gold purchase almost doubled to 22 tons in 2018.

The 2.5-percent of discounted royalty on gold mining ended on Jan. 1. Since then, 5 to 10 percent royalty taxes on gold mining have been imposed on miners.

As a result, the central bank purchased only 772.1 kg of gold from legal entities and individuals in the first three months of this year, down 71.6 percent year on year.

During its extraordinary session on March 18-29, the Mongolian parliament decided to set the gold royalty at a 5 percent rate to revive the central bank's gold purchase.

The new rate came into force on Monday, according to the central bank.

In May last year, the Mongolian central bank launched the campaign called "National Gold to the Fund of Treasures" for the first time, which lasted for five months.