Happy in Bhutan

Local journalist Dawa covers Post-2015 consultations
in Samdrup Jonkhar, Bhutan

Post and photos by Kevin, JPC with UNDP Bhutan:

"I write this from the tropical Southern lowlands of Bhutan, literally looking across the border to India.  The town is Phuentsholing, and I am wrapping up a 12-day trip around this beautiful and stunningly diverse country (geographically that is, while in fact it is surprisingly homogeneous culturally).  I have been travelling with 2 UN colleagues from the office we work in, in the capital Thimphu, as well as a crew from the BBS (Bhutan Broadcasting Service). 

Covering BBS's coverage of Post-2015 consultations in rural Bhutan

We have been going around the country doing consultations towards Bhutan’s contribution to Post-2015/Millennium Development Goal planning.  With the UN having decided that they need more input from the grassroots, from people on the ground, from rural people, women, youth, and those whose voices too often go unheard, Bhutan was selected as one country where consultations would take place to listen to what these voices have to say.  As part of my Communications junior professional consultancy here, arranged through UNA-Canada, I have had the opportunity to travel with this television crew to cover their filming of consultations that will later be aired on BBS, which are in the format of dialogues with local leaders and development stakeholders.  We have also had the pleasure of traipsing through rural areas trying to find people who would speak with us and give us their views about where they think Bhutan should be headed with its development agenda, as well as how Bhutan might be able to help shape the international development dialogue.

  

David Suzuki speaks to the IEWG in Thimphu, 2013

Bhutan is a small country with a tiny population, but it has come to play a very important role in this dialogue in recent times.  Outside of the country, when many people hear about Bhutan, the country is virtually synonymous with its unique development paradigm, Gross National Happiness.  Last year, Bhutan convened an international meeting of experts at UN headquarters in New York to discuss what truly holistic and inclusive development looks like, and to begin to explore how a new development paradigm, could be formulated.  A follow-up to this meeting was held here in Bhutan at the beginning of this year, and I was able to attend this high-level meeting of this International Expert Working Group (IEWG) as an observer for UNDP, hear the thoughts of luminaries such as David Suzuki on this matter, and cover this meeting for our website and Facebook page (UNDP Bhutan).  The Group aims to present a report to the UN General Assembly later this year which will evaluate the potential for Happiness, or in this case the somewhat equivalent term ‘well-being,’ as an alternative to the MDGs, and as a more holistic and multi-dimensional definition and aim for the global development agenda beyond 2015.
 

As I head back to Thimphu in a few days, I am contemplating the report which I will write which looks to the Post-2015 consultations that I have been attending, thinking about how the Bhutanese Voice can be made heard on the international stage, as well as how important Happiness indeed is to us all.  The report I have been tasked with, and for which I have much support from my wonderful colleagues here, may be submitted as part of Bhutan’s presentation to the UN later this year, of the country’s suggestions as to how the future of global development should look, and what it should aim for.  I am amazed at the substance of this task, and that I am playing such a role in my time here as a JPC.  And I am thankful to UNA-Canada for providing me with the opportunity to be living in this special place and contributing in such a way, not just to Bhutan, but potentially even to the world beyond it."