Reimagining development in the LDCs: an interview with Chime Wangdi
Channel: IIED
Date: 2016-07-04

This is an interview with Chime Wangdi, secretary general of the Tarayana Foundation, Bhutan, discussing how Bhutan is working towards sustainable development.

Wangdi says Bhutan is pursuing a ‘global happiness goal’; the end result of development is the happiness of individuals. 

Having set that as a national goal, Bhutan's government has identified many different kinds of contributors and civil society institutions, including the Tarayana Foundation.

She says her organisation is partnering with Bhutan's government to implement local mobilisation, working to ensure that development initiatives are identified and driven by local communities.

She says there is clear acknowledgment that empowered local communities are generally better at identifying local issues and solutions. She says the foundation considers itself as facilitators in the process of getting communities to recognise their own strengths and helping them to link up with government agencies who have the technical skills required to tackle certain problems. 

Wangdi says that engaging with local communities across the globe will deliver a myriad of different unique solutions for the global problems that we face.

Wangdi was interviewed at a dialogue event on 13 June 2016. The event, entitled, 'Reimagining development in the LDCs: what role for the SDGs?', was organised by the LDC IEG, IIED and the ESRC's STEPS Centre.

More information: http://www.iied.org/reimagining-LDCs