In a tasteful black and chrome interior, there are rails of perfectly placed turquoise jackets. There are shoes and belts, and black beaded tops with a price tag of over usd700 (£460). This is the brand new Emporio Armani store off Sukhbaatar Square, Ulan Bator, Mongolia.

In sub-zero temperatures, it is hard to believe you could find a place warm enough to wear these clothes in Mongolia. And who will shop here when a third of the population live below the poverty line?

But the high-end Western brands that are opening up in the Mongolian capital are looking to the future, and what promises to be a lucrative market.

Mongolia is about to experience an unprecedented boom. By 2013, the mining of some of the world's largest unexploited mineral deposits will begin to herald a transformation of the economy.

In 2008, the GDP of this former Soviet satellite state was usd5.3bn. In the next decade, that could triple.

"That is realistic," says D Zorigt, Mongolia's minister for mineral resources and energy. "These are world-class mines."