The Green Monarch

        Article 5 of The Constitution of the Kingdom of Bhutan (2008) states that, 

གཞུང་གིས་ རྒྱལ་ཁབ་ཀྱི་རང་བཞིན་ཐོན་ཁུངས་ཚུ་གི་སྲུང་འཛིན་དང་ སྣོད་བཅུད་ཀྱི་གནས་ ལུགས་དེ་ལུ་ཉམས་ཆག་ཚུ་ སྔོན་འགོག་འབད་ནིའི་དོན་ལུ་    འབྲུག་གི་ས་ཆའི་ཁྱོན་བསྡོམས་ ལས་ཉུང་ཤོས་བརྒྱ་དཔྱ་དྲུག་ཅུ་ཐམ་པ་ དུས་དང་རྣམ་པ་ཀུན་ཏུ་ནགས་ཚལ་གྱི་ཁྱབ་བརྡལ་འོག་ ལུ་འཛིན་སྐྱོང་ངེས་གཏན་འཐབ་དགོ། ༼འབྲུག་གི་རྩ་ཁྲིམས་ཆེན་མོ, ༢༠༠༨, ཤོག་གྲངས ༡༦༽

“The Government shall ensure that, in order to conserve the country’s natural resources and to prevent degradation of the ecosystem, a minimum of sixty percent of Bhutan’s total land shall be maintained under forest cover for all time” (The Constitution of The Kingdom of Bhutan, 2008, p. 12)

2022 Blue Planet Prize for His Majesty King Jigme Singye Wangchuck: Courtesy; Click LINK

        In keeping with the mandates of the Kingdom’s Constitution, today Bhutan reportedly maintains more than 74 percent of the country under forest cover in the form of sanctuaries and parks. There is no wonder that Bhutan contributes to the system of rich biological corridors in the world, absorbing the highest carbon footprints. 

 

        Despite being an economically developing nation, Bhutan is the first carbon-negative country in the world.  More than 6 million tonnes of carbon are absorbed annually although Bhutan produces only 1.5 million tonnes. 

 

        Thanks to His Majesty King Jigme Singye Wangchuck, the fourth Druk Gyalpo, who was the pioneer in drafting our unique constitution guaranteeing 60 percent forest cover for future generations. Conservation of the Environment is one of the four pillars of the Gross National Happiness, a developmental paradigm promulgated by His Majesty King Jigme Singye Wangchuck in 1972.

 

        The 2022 Blue Planet Prize conferred by the ASAHI Glass Foundation in Japan, is His Majesty the King’s fourth international honour for prioritising environmental preservation alongside the nation’s economic development.

 

        His Majesty the King was awarded the “Champions of the Earth’s Award” in 2005 for his pioneering efforts in environmental stewardship. The J Paul Getty Conservation Leadership Award was conferred to His Majesty the following year. Later that same year, His Majesty received the Earth Hall of Fame, Kyoto Award from Japan.

 

        Bhutan is truly fortunate to have been blessed with a Monarch like His Majesty the King. 

 

        Elsewhere, we read history and saw nations fall apart due to power struggles and megalomaniac leadership. In Bhutan, His Majesty the 4th King renounced his Kingship in 2008. To provide early Kinghood know-how, the visionary monarch King Jigme Singye Wangchuck paved the way for His Majesty King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck, the then Crown Prince of Bhutan. Today we have been bestowed with the King of unparalleled quality. The same year, democracy was introduced in Bhutan.

 

                    Long Live Your Majesty.