organic farms

The World's First 100% Organic Nation?


By Emily Main

Topics: organic farming






Greater profits and self-sufficiency are two of the major driving forces behind the move, Thinley added in his address. Bhutan currently imports more food than it can produce, which means farmers are losing out on a valuable revenue stream. And neighboring India is experiencing "exponential growth" in demand for organic food, a demand, he said, that isn't likely to taper off anytime soon.

Then there's the issue of clean water. A third of Bhutan's citizens get their water from rural sources, which can easily become polluted by chemical fertilizers, and 6 in 10 children living in rural areas do suffer from health problems that can be traced back to polluted, unsanitary water.

But the move to convert all Bhutan's farms to organic is driven as much by those factors as it is by a desire to achieve "Gross National Happiness," a term Bhutan's fourth king coined three decades ago as a more important measure of success than gross national product. "The main reason why we would like to motivate rural living is because we are convinced that it is on the farm that people can find happiness amid vital communities boosted by the necessity of interdependence, active spiritual life, and daily communion with nature and other living beings," he said.


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