ULAN BATOR, March 29 (Xinhua) -- The Mongolian economy has been recovering better than expected with strong growth, thanks to the cost-cutting measures taken by the government over the past year, an International Monetary Fund (IMF) official said Thursday.

The Executive Board of the IMF completed the third review of Mongolia's performance on Wednesday under a program supported by a three-year extended arrangement under the Extended Fund Facility.

"Since the economic conditions have improved, the Mongolian authorities need to focus on long-term sustainable policies ... and make more efforts to diversify its economy," Resident Representative of the IMF to Mongolia Neil Saker said.

The IMF Executive Board approved the arrangement in 2017, in an amount equivalent to about 434.3 million U.S. dollars to support Mongolia's economic reform.

Mongolia, with a population of over three million and gross domestic product (GDP) of some 12 billion dollars, is heavily dependent on mining and commodities exports.

With the help of the IMF's program, Mongolia's GDP grew 5.1 percent year on year in 2017, compared to 1 percent for the previous year. The figure was higher than the 3.3 percent forecast by the IMF.

The IMF has predicted that Mongolia's GDP growth will reach 5 percent this year and 6.3 percent next year.