WUNRN

GENDER - "Happiness" in Bhutan

for Women & Girls?

Bhutan CEDAW Review is Part 2

of This WUNRN Release.

The Bhutan UPR Universal Periodic Review is scheduled for the Sixth Session UN Human Rights Council UPR Review (30 Nov-11 Dec. 2009)

____________________________________________________________________________

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/07/world/asia/07bhutan.html

Link Includes Video.

"Specifically, the Bhutan Government has determined that the four pillars of a happy society involve the economy, culture, the environment and good governance. It breaks these into nine domains: psychological well-being, ecology, health, education, culture, living standards, time use, community vitality and good governance, each with its own weighted and unweighted G.N.H. index."

May 7, 2009

Thimphu Journal

BHUTAN - Gross National Happiness & Well Being

By SETH MYDANS

THIMPHU, Bhutan — If the rest of the world cannot get it right in these unhappy times, this tiny Buddhist kingdom high in the Himalayan Mountains says it is working on an answer.

“Greed, insatiable human greed,” said Prime Minister Jigme Thinley of Bhutan, describing what he sees as the cause of today’s economic catastrophe in the world beyond the snow-topped mountains. “What we need is change,” he said in the whitewashed fortress where he works. “We need to think gross national happiness.”

The notion of gross national happiness was the inspiration of the former king, Jigme Singye Wangchuck, in the 1970s as an alternative to the gross national product. Now, the Bhutanese are refining the country’s guiding philosophy into what they see as a new political science, and it has ripened into government policy just when the world may need it, said Kinley Dorji, secretary of information and communications.

“You see what a complete dedication to economic development ends up in,” he said, referring to the global economic crisis. “Industrialized societies have decided now that G.N.P. is a broken promise.”

Under a new Constitution adopted last year, government programs — from agriculture to transportation to foreign trade — must be judged not by the economic benefits they may offer but by the happiness they produce.

The goal is not happiness itself, the prime minister explained, a concept that each person must define for himself. Rather, the government aims to create the conditions for what he called, in an updated version of the American Declaration of Independence, “the pursuit of gross national happiness.”

The Bhutanese have started with an experiment within an experiment, accepting the resignation of the popular king as an absolute monarch and holding the country’s first democratic election a year ago.

The change is part of attaining gross national happiness, Mr. Dorji said. “They resonate well, democracy and G.N.H. Both place responsibility on the individual. Happiness is an individual pursuit and democracy is the empowerment of the individual.”

It was a rare case of a monarch’s unilaterally stepping back from power, and an even rarer case of his doing so against the wishes of his subjects. He gave the throne to his son, Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck, who was crowned in November in the new role of constitutional monarch without executive power.

Bhutan is, perhaps, an easy place to nimbly rewrite economic rules — a country with one airport and two commercial planes, where the east can only be reached from the west after four days’ travel on mountain roads.

No more than 700,000 people live in the kingdom, squeezed between the world’s two most populous nations, India and China, and its task now is to control and manage the inevitable changes to its way of life. It is a country where cigarettes are banned and television was introduced just 10 years ago, where traditional clothing and architecture are enforced by law and where the capital city has no stoplight and just one traffic officer on duty.

If the world is to take gross national happiness seriously, the Bhutanese concede, they must work out a scheme of definitions and standards that can be quantified and measured by the big players of the world’s economy.

“Once Bhutan said, ‘O.K., here we are with G.N.H.,’ the developed world and the World Bank and the I.M.F. and so on asked, ‘How do you measure it?’ ” Mr. Dorji said, characterizing the reactions of the world’s big economic players. So the Bhutanese produced an intricate model of well-being that features the four pillars, the nine domains and the 72 indicators of happiness.

Specifically, the government has determined that the four pillars of a happy society involve the economy, culture, the environment and good governance. It breaks these into nine domains: psychological well-being, ecology, health, education, culture, living standards, time use, community vitality and good governance, each with its own weighted and unweighted G.N.H. index.

All of this is to be analyzed using the 72 indicators. Under the domain of psychological well-being, for example, indicators include the frequencies of prayer and meditation and of feelings of selfishness, jealousy, calm, compassion, generosity and frustration as well as suicidal thoughts.

“We are even breaking down the time of day: how much time a person spends with family, at work and so on,” Mr. Dorji said.

Every two years, these indicators are to be reassessed through a nationwide questionnaire, said Karma Tshiteem, secretary of the Gross National Happiness Commission, as he sat in his office at the end of a hard day of work that he said made him happy.

Gross national happiness has a broader application for Bhutan as it races to preserve its identity and culture from the encroachments of the outside world.....

_____________________________________________________________________________

16/01/2004

Press Release
WOM/1426

http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2004/wom1426.doc.htm

Committee on Elimination of

Discrimination against Women

636^th Meeting (AM)*

WOMEN’S ANTI-DISCRIMINATION COMMITTEE TAKES UP REPORT OF BHUTAN

Country’s Representative Says ‘Consistent

Steps’ Taken to Comply with Letter, Spirit of Convention

In the two decades since Bhutan ratified the Women’s Convention without reservation, the Government had taken consistent steps to progressively comply with the letter and spirit of that Treaty, despite constraints in resources and institutional capacity, the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women was told today.

That small, land-locked country in the eastern Himalayas, which spanned one of the most rugged terrains on earth, had significantly improved the welfare of its population and undergone a major social, economic, and political transformation, its Minister for Labour and Human Resources, Lyonpo Ugyen Tshering, said in presenting Bhutan’s initial through its sixth periodic report to the Treaty’s monitoring body. Bhutan was now preparing its first-ever constitution, he said.

As a result of the country’s quest to modernize, average life expectancy had increased from 48 to more than 66 years, infant mortality had declined, and 90 per cent of the population now had free access to health care, he noted. Literacy, at 17 per cent in 1977, was now at 54 per cent, and enrolment in primary school was up to 72 per cent, with Bhutan well on its way to achieving universal primary education by 2007. The greatest challenge in achieving the goals of the Convention was to eradicate the more subdued and indirect forms of gender bias.

One of the Committee’s 23 experts, who serve in their personal capacities, said Bhutan had always been a country of great interest and mystery to her. The expert from the Republic of Korea said that Bhutan had had the advantage of learning from other more developed countries. She hoped it would not repeat their mistakes in its development. She stressed the importance of data collection and sex-disaggregated data for mapping the country’s future development.

Several experts acknowledged the many efforts under way, but felt that the report had revealed a “certain hesitation” about its plans to address discrimination. The expert from Portugal, for example, pointed out the report’s statement that, while there was recognition of discrimination, not much support existed for promoting women’s advancement. National policies, although “gender neutral”, had often failed to protect women from discrimination, she noted, citing the report.

Similarly, the expert from Bangladesh said that throughout the whole system there was a “kind of acceptance” of the negative realities and a sense that traditional perceptions and Bhutan’s history somehow condoned those. Women were responsible for all home work and were considered almost entirely in their roles as wives and mothers and the keepers of the very extended families, especially in the rural areas. She wanted to know whether any effort had been made to change those attitudes or address the stereotypes in the school curricula.

Approaching the situation of Bhutanese women from another angle, the expert from the Netherlands was among the experts who had questions about the marriage age of 15 years for common-law marriage and the fact that no marriage certificate was issued for common-law marriages. He worried that the existence of common-law marriages was undermining the legal age of 18 for marriage, and he asked if the Government would consider ending the practice of common law marriages.

Further, the expert from Mexico stated that, throughout the report, references had been made to marriage between relatives, specifically that any marriage contracted between individuals within an acceptable degree of relationship were accepted in certain areas, and that such practice was not considered to be incestuous. Had the Government envisaged changing such practices by means of education or consciousness-raising? she asked.

Other questions were raised about prostitution, “clandestine abortions” and the high birth rate, domestic violence, citizenship rights, access to higher education, equal access to employment and the means to evolve a healthy balance between urban and rural development. Replies of the Government will be heard on 22 January.

Additional members of Bhutan’s delegation were: Daw Penjo, Permanent Representative of Bhutan to the United Nations; Tshering Penjor, First Secretary, Permanent Mission of Bhutan to the United Nations; Ugyen Wangdi, Office of Legal Affairs; Rinchhen Chophel, Ministry of Health; Kesang Choden, Department of Aid and Debt Management; Yangey Penjor, Youth Development Fund; Tshering Pem, United Nations Development Programme, Thimphu; Sangye Rinchhen, International Convention Division; and Kinga Singye, Head, Policy Planning Division, Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The Committee will meet again at 10 a.m. Tuesday, 20 January, to continue its consideration of country reports.

Background

Before the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women was the combined initial, second and third reports of Bhutan (document CEDAW/C/BTN/1-3), which states that Bhutanese women enjoy freedom and equality in many spheres of life with a relatively high status, in contrast to situations found in many other developing countries. Women comprise 49.5 per cent of the total population of about 698,000 in the Kingdom. Because there is largely equality between women and men in Bhutan, overt discrimination against women does not exist.

The report concedes, however, that this is a “broad overview” of the complexity of the status of Bhutanese women, and that there is room for further improving social, cultural and economic factors that disadvantage Bhutanese women. The biggest challenge nationwide is to eradicate the more subdued and indirect forms of gender bias encountered at home and in the workplace. Despite Bhutan’s unique approach to development -- “Gross National Happiness”, which stresses, instead of material rewards, individual development irrespective of gender -- many ingrained sociocultural perceptions nationwide hold women as less capable and confident than men. These aim at validating male superiority, while not adequately recognizing female capabilities.

The social status of women in Bhutan also varies between ethnic communities, and between Buddhist- and Hindu-influenced social practices, the report finds. Thus, despite equal opportunities, regarding entitlements and legal status for women and men, differences persist in equitable access, particularly in education, enterprise development and governance. This leads to significantly lower levels of achievement for Bhutanese women and girls. Existing gender gaps appear to be narrowing, although gender-disaggregated data are not yet adequate to provide strong factual information. Much more comprehensive gender-disaggregated data must be compiled and analysed.

Women, children and gender are an important area of the current ninth five-year plan (2002-2007), and the Government recognizes that discrimination against women is fundamentally unjust and constitutes an offence against human dignity. Bhutan ratified the Convention on 31 August 1981 and, unlike numerous other States parties, has never raised any reservations. The National Women’s Association of Bhutan has been designated as the public entity to improve women’s socio-economic conditions and encourage their participation in development activities.

The report notes that, although few specific follow-up actions have been taken in line with the Convention, given that many of the Convention’s principles already are integrated into national laws, an existing forum of gender focal persons is being revitalized with greater sharing, learning and capacity-building to further enhance mainstreaming of gender issues in the Government. While no parallel projects will be formulated especially for women, the Government is committed to mainstreaming measures related to the promotion of women in development into all sectoral projects and programmes. At the same time, it must be ensured that the commitment to mainstreaming is not misconstrued simply because women are welcome to participate in all programmes, and attention must be given to formulating clear and measurable results and indicators for gender issues.

Significant progress has occurred, the report contends, particularly in the major areas of education and health. There have been major reductions in maternal, under-5 and infant mortality rates; initiation of widespread gender-sensitive programmes in nutrition and maternal health; specific prioritization of reproductive health in national policies; establishment of community schools to promote higher enrolment of girls; and vigorous promotion of non-formal education programmes, where the vast majority of beneficiaries are women.

The report states that all persons are equal before the law in Bhutan, but social customs that differentiate between women and men are still prevalent, primarily in the area of inheritance, where in most parts of the country women usually inherit the land. With regard to marriage, divorce, child custody and other family matters, local practices reflect freedom and flexibility and guarantee women equal rights and protection. However, certain remaining laws require revisions, including laws on polygamy and polyandry, restricted benefits upon marriage to an expatriate and sexual assault laws in incidents that do not constitute rape.

Formally enshrining in the law the concept of equal pay for equal work, at all levels, with specific penalties for violation, will strengthen it beyond its current inclusion in civil-service regulations, the report states. Because of the general overall equality of women and men, no legislation explicitly prohibits discrimination against women, including unintentional and/or indirect discrimination, nor is there a national definition of discrimination against women congruent with the Convention.

In the family sphere, the report finds that the predominant religious and social values better protect most Bhutanese women, compared to those in other countries, and principles of tolerance and respect are emphasized. Overall, parents do not have a preference for sons and give as much care to girls as boys. Women are favoured in terms of inheritance in many parts of the country and they often head the households, taking major household decisions together with husbands and sharing productive work. Instances of female infanticide, dowry deaths, bride burning, vicious acid attacks and organized trafficking in women are absent.

Further, the report says that lack of education represents a particular constraint to full gender equality, and areas for substantive attention in the ninth plan will include increasing enrolment of girls at higher levels of education, as well as dramatically improving female literacy. Although gender disaggregated official statistical data is not available, it is estimated that total female illiteracy is only half that of men. Overall literacy in the country is 54 per cent.

In health, Bhutan is beginning to view women’s health in a more holistic way, as part of the overall life cycle and expanding beyond the realm of reproductive health. Even so, continued attention is being given to reproductive health to consolidate recent gains, which have allowed the population growth rate to decline from 3.l per cent yearly to 2.5 per cent. With a rising number of sex workers inside Bhutan, primarily in border towns, the Government is also increasingly facing a dilemma about how to deal with the sex trade and, in particular, its health implications in terms of HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections.

Women’s participation in the labour force, particularly in the modern sector, remains modest, the report notes. The majority of women are still involved in agriculture. Lower levels of education and skill enhancement result in women being “less employable”, particularly in urban centres. Although some urban women are now prominent as the heads of successful businesses, most women remain concentrated in low-skilled and low-paid jobs with often limited promotion prospects. With the emergence of rapidly increasing rural to urban migration, many girls and women find themselves employed as domestic help, particularly in childcare.

To counter this trend, however, the ninth five-year plan will encourage establishment of childcare centres and nurseries to ease burdens on working urban families, the report says. Initiatives taken by the Queens and other female members of the Royal Family to serve the Government, particularly in leading social services activities, are providing positive female role models and encouragement to girls and women to participate in public service. At the same time, there remains scope for improvement in Bhutanese women’s participation as an active force in the political life of the country.

Despite positive indicators, however, a 2001 baseline gender study found that many women feel that men are better equipped to understand and participate in matters of governance, the report states. Many women also remain reticent to speak in public, particularly if they are illiterate. Women, thus, are very much underrepresented in block and district development committees, as well as in national government. Women do participate, however, in the election of village heads and representatives to the National Assembly and attend public village meetings.

Study findings further indicate that extensive travel and/or the demands of household and farm work tend to prevent women from attending higher-level meetings. Encouragingly, however, 14 of 99 elected people’s representatives to the National Assembly are women, and one of six Royal Advisory Councillors is also female. A 1998 Royal Decree underscored the importance of women’s representation in public life. Regarding access to credit, women’s rights are largely unimpeded, but may vary between ethnic groups, and a review of credit patterns still indicates the leading role of men in taking most investment decisions. Extension of microcredit to rural women for income generation has been a priority.

The report identifies that a new and important area of concern where action is being taken concerns violence against women and sexual abuse/harassment. Steps are beginning to get under way to sensitize police, judges, doctors, teachers, mass media and political leaders alike to domestic and sexual violence through education and awareness training, in order to make intervention more effective. A new and strong focus will be given to the eradication of sexual abuse and sexual harassment of women and girls, particularly in the workplace, at school and in rural social life.

The report concludes that, despite various constrains in its implementation of the Convention -– not least of which is the significant lack of human resources -- the Government is sincere in its determination not to be part of the pervasive, structural and systemic denial of rights that affects women and girls worldwide. Bhutan will build on its established “bedrock of commitment” to gender equality and will ensure that this is raised in the future to the next level and beyond, it states.

Introduction of Report

Presenting his country’s initial through sixth periodic report, LYONPO UGYEN TSHERING, Minister for Labour and Human Resources of Bhutan, explained that Bhutan was a small, landlocked kingdom in the eastern Himalayas, which encompassed one of the most rugged terrains on earth. Before the inception of planned economic development, Bhutan was predominantly agrarian with a barter economy and no modern infrastructure. There were only 11 schools, with an enrolment of fewer than 500 students. Modern health communication facilities were practically non-existent.

He said that, since 1961, Bhutan had made significant progress in improving the welfare of its population. The country also witnessed a major social, economic, and political transformation. Today, Bhutan was widely acknowledged by its development partners as a model for sustainable development. Its development philosophy of “Gross National Happiness” had provided a holistic framework for the country’s social, economic and political development process over the last four decades. Four major areas had been identified as the main pillars of that process, namely, economic growth and development, preservation and promotion of cultural heritage, preservation and sustainable use of the environment, and good governance.

Guided by that policy, Bhutan had been able to achieve equitable socio-economic progress, establish a democratic framework of governance, and preserve its rich cultural heritage and pristine environment, he said. Between 1984 and 2000, the average life expectancy increased from 48 to 66.1 years. Infant mortality declined from 142 to 60 per 1,000 live births, and health coverage rose from 65 per cent to 90 per cent of the population. Literacy increased from 17 per cent in 1977 to the current rate of 54 per cent. The primary school enrolment rate had reached 72 per cent and Bhutan was well on its way to achieving universal primary education by 2007.

Continuing, he said that per capita income increased from an estimated $51 in 1961 to $755 today. While still according highest priority to the social sectors of health and education, Bhutan had recently begun expanding its development strategies to include private sector development and environmentally sustainable industrialization. Political reforms had also been progressively introduced to bring about an effective democratic system. Those reforms included separation of the legislative, executive, and judicial branches, and the devolution of full executive powers by the King to an elected council of ministers (1998). A constitution was currently being drafted.

Recalling that Bhutan ratified the Women’s Convention in 1981 without reservation, he said that resource and institutional capacity constraints had prevented it from meeting its reporting obligations on time. The Government had taken consistent steps to progressively comply with the letter and spirit of the treaty, as well as to systematically address the constraints in meeting its reporting obligations. Those included strengthening institutional capacity and augmenting the resources of the relevant legal and executive arms of government. The establishment of the Office of Legal Affairs, the International Convention Division in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the National Commission for Women and Children were some of the more recent steps taken towards that goal.

In preparing the report, the Planning Commission undertook a gender baseline study –- the first of its kind -– with support from United Nations agencies in 2001, he noted. The findings and recommendations provided valuable input for the preparation of the report. Consultations and workshops were also convened, involving not only the government focal points and United Nations agencies, but also stakeholders from civil society as full partners in the process. Further, the Convention and the updated summary of the report had been translated in the local languages and disseminated to the population, in order to raise awareness of the Convention and gender issues.

Following ratification of the Convention, a committee had been formed to monitor the country’s commitments, he went on. Also, three studies were completed on health, education, and water and sanitation, as those were areas that directly affected women’s well-being. That was followed up by the establishment of a forum of gender focal points in various ministries, under the leadership of the Planning Commission secretariat. Given Bhutan’s understanding of the need for a strong legal framework to eliminate discrimination against women, numerous laws had been enacted to protect women’s special interests and rights.

Among them was the Inheritance Act of 1980, he said. That guaranteed equal rights to women to land and property, but that right was “de facto” safeguarded in most communities, due to the predominant traditional practice of the matriarchal inheritance system, which favoured women. The Marriage Act of 1980 guaranteed equality in marriage and family life. Its amendment in 1996 not only raised the legal age for marriage from 16 to 18 for both sexes, but also protected and favoured women facing “unmarried pregnancies” or child custodial rights. The Rape Act of 1996 sought to protect women against sexual abuse and assault by imposing severe financial penalties and prison sentences on offenders. Those provisions were being incorporated into the draft Bhutan Penal Code. The Police Act of 1980 and Prison Act of 1982 protected the special rights of women inmates.

He said that, although the law prohibited trafficking in women, Bhutan had also ratified the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) Convention on the Prevention and Combating of Trafficking in Women and Children for Prostitution. The draft constitution clearly states that a woman had the right to be free from all forms of discrimination and exploitation, including trafficking, prostitution, abuse and violence. It also guaranteed women the right to free and consensual marriage and the right to family.

Overall, the high priority given to women in Bhutan’s national policy was clearly reflected in the country’s socio-economic policies, he said. In the area of health, prior to 1961 Bhutan’s health infrastructure consisted of four rudimentary hospitals and a handful of dispensaries. Communicable diseases were widespread, and more than half of all children died at birth or during infancy. Water supplies were largely confined to springs and streams. Thus, creating a basic health infrastructure was an urgent priority. By the end of 2002, Bhutan had 29 hospitals, 160 basic health units and 20 indigenous treatment centres providing free access to more than 90 per cent of the country’s population.

He said that significant improvements had resulted. Between 1984 and 2000, maternal mortality fell from 7.7 to 2.5 per 1,000 live births. Both by custom and law, women had rights to reproductive health care. The comprehensive Reproductive Health Programme launched during the eighth five-year plan continued to address women’s specific needs. Bhutan had also achieved 77.8 per cent access to safe and piped water, which had a direct bearing on improving the health and reducing the burden of labour for women. In education, 40 years ago Bhutan had only 11 primary schools catering to fewer than 500 children. Today, it had about 130,000 students in 412 schools, with girls accounting for 47 per cent of the total enrolment.

In employment, formalized gender bias did not exist, and there was no distinct division of labour between men and women, he said. For instance, although ploughing the fields was generally regarded as a man’s job and housekeeping as a woman’s, that was not a rigid practice. In a household “short of women”, men also engaged in routine domestic work. The task of cultivation, from sowing to harvesting, was shared equally. Also, the head of a household was not a gender-specific domain. Usually, the more capable person -– often the wife or eldest daughter -– assumed that sector. The Royal Civil Service Rules guaranteed women equal pay and employment opportunities in Government, while the labour policies ensured equal wage rates. Increasingly, many businesses were also being owned and run by women, and more than 40 per cent of participants in vocational training institutes were women, which would enhance their urban sector employment.

He said that women’s empowerment in decision-making through wider representation, both quantitatively and qualitatively, continued to be promoted. In 1961, the civil service was male-dominated. Today, women comprised 26 per cent of the civil service. That was steadily improving, not only in terms of numbers, but also in terms of provisions. In 2003, Bhutan appointed two women as the Foreign Secretary and Finance Secretary, which were among the most senior positions in government. Representation of women in the diplomatic and international forums was notable, in that out of 35 foreign services officers, 14 were women.

The laws and development policies of Bhutan had always sought to ensure equal rights, as well as the security and well-being of women in society, he concluded. Bhutan was fully aware of the challenges to comprehensively achieve the goals of the Convention. The challenge in Bhutan was to eradicate the more subdued and indirect forms of gender bias existing within society or emerging as a consequence of change. Despite equal opportunities and entitlements, and equal legal status for women and men, differences were seen in equitable access, particularly in education, enterprise development and governance, leading to lower levels of achievement for Bhutanese women and girls. Societal perceptions that women were physically weaker and more vulnerable had greatly influenced their access to educational and employment opportunities. Women’s own perception of themselves seemed to be based on those two factors, as well.

He said that Bhutan recognized that, as the economy and society modernized, diverse needs emerged. That, in turn, prompted shifts in traditional roles and responsibilities, values, transformation of family patterns and rural-urban migration, among others. Experience had revealed that, during such transition, women and children were particularly vulnerable. The Government had acknowledged the emerging economic and social trends and had committed resources and redirected plans and programmes to mainstream gender needs and interests. It also recognized the need to remind itself about the changing nature of how women’s rights were affected and the need for social, economic and legal remedial measures on a continuous basis, he said.

================================================================
To contact the list administrator, or to leave the list, send an email to: wunrn_listserve-request@lists.wunrn.com. Thank you.