Bridge To Bhutan

Costa Rica is consulting with Bhutan for how to remain among the happiest places on earth.

A small country of 680,000 inhabitants, the Kingdom of Bhutan is located in the Himalaya mountains on the eastern border of India, and is the only country in the world to measure the happiness of their country like most countries measure their gross domestic product.

Costa Rica, which topped a list drawn up by the United Kingdom’s New Economics Foundation for being the country with the highest life satisfaction, is looking to Bhutan for tips on how to remain in first place.

Bhutan began measuring the happiness of its people in 2008. On a census distributed nationwide, the last question on the form was, “Are you happy?” a question which 97 percent answered affirmatively. (more…)

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Should there be alternative to the GDP?

In an email interview with The Nation, US-based historian, Eric Zencey says it’s time to ditch The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for a more meaningful and inclusive index which can more accurately measure country performances.

Why should we be thinking of an alternative to the GDP now?

GDP is a deeply foolish measure of economic progress and well-being.  It was never designed to measure either of those, and we ought to find a better measure as soon as possible.  Anytime is a good time to do this, but the downturn we’re facing now makes this an additionally opportune time.  What we’re seeing economically is in many ways unprecedented, and its resolution will require thinking in ways we haven’t thought before.  In practical terms, with GDP down worldwide, a change now is easier.  The new measure could be implemented and could guide policy toward an economic recovery that gives us more of what we really want, which is social well-being, not just economic activity. (more…)

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For a long time, Bhutan didn’t want to measure happiness. Simply ask one question- Are you happy in Bhutan? and you have the answer… Since the world is increasingly obsessed with numbers, the Center for Bhutan Studies in Bhutan along with the international academia & development practitioners, came up with a formula after several international conferences on GNH. The first conference was held in 2004 in Thimphu, Bhutan and in 2010, it will be held in Brazil.

Happiness formula: Jealousy, sexual misconduct, or apathy toward reciting prayers – Bhutan is now ready with a set of mathematical formulae to measure these personal feelings and collect it all to calculate the country’s happiness.

Happiness formula uses 72 indicators, from reciting prayers to buying second-hand clothes.

For all those GNH skeptics who said happiness can never be measured, the Centre for Bhutan Studies is ready with the tools. (more…)

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By Tim Girivin (www.girvin.com)

I recently toured Bhutan. And it was a long-held dream for me. Some 40 years earlier, in teaching classes on design, calligraphy and illustration to support tuition in college, I referenced some imagery from Bhutan in our exploration of design strategy. The idea of the power of writing, in prayer wheels, as a device of spiritual magnitude was part of that study – the wheel turns, the prayers unfold, visions emanate, dreams emerge, answers are found.  There is profound power in that concept – and I’ll never forget that time, nor my firsthand experience of seeing this in Bhutan, finally, after all these years.

The beauty of this premise is found everywhere in Bhutan; the wheel of prayer - it’s at the heart of the spirit of this amazing land. And that’s what I came looking for – to find the spirit of the people and the vision of this explication in every detail of their lives. And this can be found in the simple, honest character of the food, the music, poetic refrains, mysticism, the deeply enriched and symbolically profound nature of the arts, the potent structures of the dzong and the stable siting and earthbound permanence of the villages. While there are surely plenty of examples of the power inherent in the cultures of the Himalayas, these characteristics are distinct to Bhutan. (more…)

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Centrepiece is poverty reduction. Attention to agriculture and allocation of resources are the unique features of this plan

The 10th Plan has generated unprecedented interest and debate in the history of development planning in Bhutan. Political exigencies have contributed to this debate in a newly established democratic setup. On many occasions, the political discussion loses out to academic merits and demerits of the issues involved. As a student of economics I have only academic interest in the nature of 10th FYP.

In my opinion, the 10th FYP is a major departure from earlier development plans in at least two perspectives: first, it is the first time the issue of poverty reduction finds a central place in the planning process; second, the allocation of resources across the dzongkhags is based on more objectively defined criteria. (more…)

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