Course:CONS200/2024WT1/Impacts of Bhutan’s Gross National Happiness Index on national conservation

Map of Bhutan

Flag of Bhutan

Bhutan, also known as the Kingdom of Bhutan is a small country in South Asia bordering both China and India. Bhutan is a landlocked nation, the territory totals about 38,394 kilometers and controls no waters due to its landlocked status. The capital of Bhutan, Thimphu, lies in the western region of the country, the valleys in the western region house most of the Bhutanese population, and, 70% of the nation is covered by extensive forests. Bhutan’s geography shows a topographic extreme, with extremely cold winters and extremely hot summers mostly due to its mountainous geographic characteristics.

The country can be divided into three lateral zones: The Great Himalaya, The Inner Himalaya and The Southern Foothills. The Great Himalaya region is a snow-wilderness zone with almost 20% completely frozen. The Inner Himalaya zone is where most of the Bhutanese major towns are located, the region encompasses broad valleys and forested hills. The last zone, the Southern Foothills shows great tropical forests and hot, steamy and unhealthy tracts.

Bhutan is a Constitutional Monarchy where the King is the head of the State and the Prime Minister is the Head of the Government. Something that differentiates Bhutan from other bordering nations is that Bhutan has a Head of the State Religion, called the Je Khenpo, this role takes care of all religious matters and also establishes Bhutan as a Buddhist religious country. As a small country bordering two big countries — China and India—, Bhutan suffered much influence from both sides and, was even acquired by the British in the 18th century and imposed as part of British India.

Starting in 1907 and until around the 1980s, Bhutan saw great development and changes in its societal structures, such as the creation of the legislature, national assembly, royal advisory council, and more. This period is important to Buthans history, as it opens doors for the improvement of Buthans social aspects.

Gross National Happiness, also known as GNH, refers to a measure of collective well-being, focusing more on holistic views of human development, instead of monetary-economical views like GDP —Gross Domestic Product— would. The GNH contains four important pillars: sustainable and equitable economic development, good governance, cultural preservation and environmental protection. Bhutan’s Gross National Happiness (GNH) index is a reflection of the country’s approach to development, prioritizing the well-being of its people and the environment over economic growth on its own. This previously mentioned approach was introduced by King Jigme Singye Wangchuck in the late 1980s, the GNH aims to harmonize social, economic, and cultural prosperity with environmental conservation, making happiness and ecological health central to Bhutan’s political development and progress.

As Bhutan modernizes, the small country is facing pressures from neighbouring countries and growing urban populations, which challenge its low-density population goals and strain its very limited resources. The Urban expansion has increased demands on the environment, with cities and agricultural areas placing stress on Bhutan’s ecosystems. Despite these challenges, Bhutan’s economic strategy—particularly its reliance on hydroelectric exports to India—supports sustainable development aligned with GNH principles. Through GNH, Bhutan seeks to balance modernization with conservation, offering a unique model for national growth and ecological care.

Political and Cultural History of Bhutan

Paro Taktsang Monastery, Bhutan. Bhutanese GNH index has a large focus on Buddhist cultural and spiritual values.

Bhutan has aimed to grow from a past isolated country to a modern nation state . To achieve this status, Bhutan focuses on their citizens well-being, socially, economically, and culturally. This is measured through a strategy called the Gross National Happiness (GNH) index that began in the late 1980s by the fourth Bhutanese King Jigme Singye Wangchuck. This approach pursuits the goal of promoting environmental conservation while at the same time concerns the benefit of Bhutan's people. With this logic, a happy society cares of the long-term past and future perspectives of the environment. The GNH holds some ethical conflicts to its scale, for example the expulsion of over 95,000 Lhotshampas (Bhutanese of Nepali ancestry living in South Bhutan) in the early 1990s, and other societal divisions that may prohibit applying GNH policies . Bhutan is independant, but has been fragmented since the mid 1600s when theocratic ruled-government of district representatives arose, until 1907 when King Wangchuck brought Bhutan back under unity (however was lacking connections to western world). Since then, India (Bhutans neighbouring nation) provides economic and political relations and guidance through policies and trades. Aside from the governing changes to Bhutan, discrepancies of confusion about Bhutanese population databases have been inaccurate, inconsistent, and wide-ranged since the sixties.

Bhutan's Environment and Geography

Dooars that stretch from North East India to South Bhutan that are at the foothills of the Himalayas

Bhutan is landlocked, and much of the terrain is high elevation mountains with valleys and forests. Indo Gangetic plains and rivers provide trade and transportation means for civilians and contribute to Bhutan's large climate variability. There is an astonishing array of habitats; from subtropical to alpine tundra, which supports a diverse collection of biota. Bhutan is divided into four distinct environmental zones: the Great Himalayas, the Inner Himalayas, the sub-Himalayan foothills, and the Dooars. These zones range from low elevation of the tropical Dooar plains to the high altitudes of the Himalayas, where snowfields cover the mountain ranges. The most important population centers in Bhutan are Thimphu, Tongsa, Bumthang and Mongar, located in the Inner Himalayan valleys.

Bhutans beautiful landscapes and biomes are vulnerable to natural and man-made changes. The countries small population and minimal land use has had little ecological imbalances, until the 1960s when changes in development and promotion of population growth changed traditional livelihoods to agricultural and urban based lives.

Severity of Environmental Impacts in Bhutan

Modernizations heavy impact on Bhutan (a recently previous isolated state) led to massive pressures of powerful neighbouring nations of trade, economic, and cultural practices . Migration and growing populations often leads to a mismatch of skills and employment opportunities. The increase in Bhutan's population reflects modernization challenges to commitment to environmental conservation and aim for happiness scaled through the GNH index because Bhutan prefers low density of population. However, when influxes of people enter into the towns, it concentrates the impact of society on the land. Bhutan's land consists of limited flat land, meaning only so many people can populate certain areas due to the majority of the country having mountainous terrain. As agricultural communities extended and urbanized, larger cities drained national resources which damaged the environment. To put Bhutans urbanization into scale, Bhutan provides 12% of GDP and 45% of national revenue from major economic strengths in exporting hydroelectric power to India . This urban planning discussed above aims to demonstrate urbanisation to improve the environmental sustainability through Gross National Happiness indexes.

What is GNH?

GNH, gross national happiness, refers to a measure of collective wellbeing, most prominently demonstrated in the kingdom of Bhutan. As opposed to GDP, gross domestic product, the more widely spread model of evaluating the supposed value of a nation, GNH makes the shift from monetary indicators to a more holistic view of human wellness. This model aims to prioritize human health and happiness over the valuation of economic growth. Through this style of national valuation, the governing bodies of Bhutan attempt to view their society in a more holistic manner, paying close attention to the resident's quality of life.

Measuring GNH

Using GNH index, the wealth of wellbeing and happiness can be measured. This index is comprised of 9 domains, under each are various conditions indicative of individual happiness. With each indicator, a person's satisfaction is measured on a scale of 0 – 1, with 1 being a perfect score. "Happiness" is achieved when a score of 66% or higher is met under these conditions.

9 Domains	Conditions
Cultural Diversity and Resilience	Speak native language Cultural participation Artistic skills Driglam Namzha
Community Vitality	Donations (time & money) Community relationships Family Safety
Ecological Diversity and Resilience	Ecological issues Environmental responsibility Wildlife damage Urbanization issues
Education	Literacy Education level Knowledge Value
Good Governance	Governmental performance Fundamental rights Services Political participation
Health	Mental health Self reported health status Healthy days Disability
Living Standards	Assets Housing Household per capita income
Psychological Wellbeing	Life satisfaction Positive emotions Negative emotions Spirituality
Time Use	Work Sleep

Driglam Namzha; a system of etiquette and behaviour followed by Bhutanese citizens, including guidelines for conduct, etiquette, and dress.

Criticism of the GNH Model

A major criticism of this model is the ambiguity of components of the measurement metric. When comparing GNH and GDP, GDP is much easier to concretely measure as it does not depend on qualitative measurement. While GNH does include some quantitative measurements, for example, appraisal of living standards, it also relies on qualitative measures, such as positive/negative emotions and life satisfaction. Personal interpretation of the 0 – 1 scale of satisfaction can also implement ambiguity into a cohesive measurement. As each person may identify the end points of the scale differently, there is a lack of unity in the data.

Bhutanese Prime Minister Tshering Tobgay, has gone on the record as saying:

In reference to the current model of national valuation, GNH; "There are four issues that can compound to make matters extremely bleak: our ballooning debt that if we're not careful will not be sustainable; the big rupee shortage; unemployment, in particular youth unemployment; and a perception of growing corruption."

The concerns addressed by this statement are as follows:

1. Increasing national debt
2. Rupee shortage
3. Unemployment
4. Perception of corruption

Responsibilities of GNH

With the consideration of the above concerns raised my Prime Minister Tobgay, Bhutan faces a multitude of challenges. Whether these issues would be mitigated by transitioning from using GNH as the primary avenue of valuation to using GDP is unclear.

Public Debt

As of projected evaluation of debt in the 2025/2026 fiscal year, Bhutan's public debt is likely to reach 122% of its total gross domestic product. Comparatively, the public debt of Nepal is expected to peak at 55.3% in the same fiscal year.

Rupee Shortage

Bhutan is currently facing a rupee shortage with a depletion foreign currency reserves. This is extremely impactful as over 74% of Bhutan's trade is with India. This currency shortage creates further issues regarding import restrictions and currency depreciation.

Bhutan's unemployment, total % of labour force. International Labour Organization. “ILO Modelled Estimates and Projections database ( ILOEST )” ILOSTAT.

Unemployment

Bhutan's unemployment rates have drastically increased over the last years. See graph, right.

To provide context, Nepal's 2023 unemployment rate, as a total percentage of the labour force, was 10.7%.

Perception of Corruption

A perception of corruption is difficult to quantify. In a model comparing the rule of law, political participation, stability of democratic institutions, and political and social integration of Bhutan to other countries in Asian and Oceanic areas, Bhutan is evaluated as above average in all these areas.

Outlook

Although GNH provides a concept of the cumulative wellness and 'happiness' of a nation, attending to the measurement of GDP more closely in conjunction with GNH may help to better monitor the economic situation of the country. This dual-edged approach may help to mitigate growing economic concerns.

In contrast to these concerns, GNH provides many unique benefits to the kingdom of Bhutan. Namely, GNH is conducive to many aspects of environmental sustainability, presenting an example of how to balance pressures with a slower-paced, more sustainable lifestyle.

GNH Effects on Bhutan's Sustainability

Within the GNH framework, the domain of Ecological Diversity and Resilience focuses on sustainability, addressing ecological and urbanization issues, environmental responsibility and wildlife damage. This scope of the index has driven the development of several policies that aim to promote more sustainable practices in Bhutan. Examples of GNH-driven policies include, for instance, the creation of protected areas, incentive to hydropower as well as the implementation of community-based conservation.

GNH Driven Policy

Bhutan has extensive and diverse forest cover, which is in its majority intact and interrupted only occasionally by human settlements. Forests cover 73% of Bhutan’s total land area compared to only 12% allocated to cultivation and grazing pastures. This evidence shows how Bhutan has been successful in avoiding forest degradation, keeping forest cover well above the 60% goal set by GNH policy.

These results are possible due to Bhutan’s efficient and comprehensive approach to environmental issues. For example, fuelwood is the power of energy to 90% of household fuel needs, making Bhutan one of the countries with highest per-capita users of wood in the world. In response, policy implemented that timber could be collected only from fallen trees and within the limit of designated parklands, which was supported by strong regulation to ensure norms were followed. This shows how policy aims to reduce environmental impacts without forgetting to acknowledge Bhutanese people's reliance on firewood.

Other GNH driven policies include incentives to hydropower, sustainable tourism and the implementation of protected areas.

Hydropower

Bhutan’s rivers provide an immense potential for renewable energy, with the capacity to generate up to 30,000 megawatts of power. Currently, several hydropower schemes are active, exporting most of the energy produced. This makes hydropower an important source of revenue to Bhutan, while it still promotes sustainability.

Tourism

Another GNH driven policy is the implementation of a $300 daily charge for tourists. The goal of this policy is to increase revenue while keeping the number of annual visitors relatively low. Despite the higher costs for tourists, visitor quantity increased 387% between 1990 to 2003. This led to a considerable increase in revenue, from which 35% is redirected to the endowment of Bhutan Trust Fund for Environmental Conservation.

Protected areas

Protected areas in Bhutan have sizes that range from 5 to over 7,000 square kilometers, and are often interconnected by biological corridors, which collectively constitute 26% of the total country’s area. Initially, these parks were exclusively controlled by the government and devoted to biodiversity conservation. However, a community-based approach was implemented and now, most parks have resident human populations that engage directly in conservation. They are allowed to farm, graze animals and collect firewood and plants according to environmental policies. This not only recognizes Bhutanese people's culture and traditional way of living, but also leads to a more sustainable management of the landscapes.

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