Student – Lama la, as a young guy, I’m concerned about the future. What do you think will be the biggest issue for the planet within the next half century, and how do you think we can face it? Are you optimistic? What can we do here in Bhutan la?
Master – For the planet, I am optimistic. Earth has survived asteroid impacts, ice ages, and mass extinctions; life will continue in one form or another. It is humanity that concerns me.
One of the greatest challenges we are likely to face is climate change. Rising temperatures, frequent extreme weather, sea-level rise, and prolonged droughts will make some densely populated regions difficult to inhabit. As people are forced to move in search of safety, water, and livelihoods, large-scale migration will heighten the risk of conflict.
Agriculture will also come under increasing pressure. Changing rainfall patterns, heatwaves, and water shortages are already reducing crop yields in many parts of the world, and this is expected to intensify — raising the risk of food and medicine insecurity and famine in vulnerable regions.
Am I optimistic? Frankly, no — at least not given the current world view. Human beings have great capacity for innovation and cooperation, but also a remarkable talent for denial, greed, and short-term thinking.
The world’s major powers already possess the technological knowhow needed to reduce emissions and limit global warming. What they lack is the political and economic will to deploy it at the necessary scale and speed.
Meaningful change too often comes only when existing power structures or financial interests are directly threatened — and by then, we may already have crossed climate thresholds that are difficult or impossible to reverse.
Yet despair is not a strategy. Every fraction of a degree of warming we prevent will save lives, ecosystems, and communities. The future is not fixed — it arises from causes and conditions that are always in flux. It will be shaped by the choices we make today: by governments, businesses, and ordinary people alike. The window for meaningful action is narrowing, but it has not yet closed.
In reality, what the planet needs now is not economic or military might, but wisdom, calm judgment, and credible role models. In this respect, Bhutan can make an important contribution, but we must hone our talents and recognise in which fields we can best provide guidance.
We speak, rightly and proudly, of being carbon negative and of our constitutional mandate to maintain at least 60% forest cover. Yet with a small population and little heavy industry, our model would be difficult for large, densely populated nations to replicate.
Initiatives such as His Majesty’s visionary Gelephu Mindfulness City have the potential to become such a model — a living demonstration of how sustainable development can be woven into environmental protection rather than set against it. But it will take a number of years before the project matures into something that can be showcased on the world stage.
In the more immediate future, Bhutan’s contribution could definitely be philosophical, though this would require our education system to be more visionary, incorporating the wisdom of the Dharma alongside scientific and technical knowledge. If this could be done, our people would be well equipped to bring a grounded, deeply ecological perspective to international discussions.
This is not a call to bring religion into the classroom. The ritual and devotional dimensions of Buddhism belong, rightly, in the monastery and the home. But its philosophical insights — impermanence, interdependence, and the nature of mind — are not matters of religious observance. They are tools for clear thinking, and every student would be enriched by engaging with them.
Buddhism teaches that everything exists in dependence upon everything else: the natural world is an interconnected web of causes and conditions, where harm to one part inevitably reverberates through the whole. Much like the organs of a living body, each element relies on the health of the others. When one organ goes awry, the entire body suffers — including the organ itself.
Buddhism also teaches something invaluable for the debating chamber: that our opinions are shaped by education, culture, and experience, and are not universal truths. This allows us to understand where others’ views originate without necessarily agreeing with them or yielding to ideas that cause harm. It offers a bird’s-eye view — the capacity to hold complexity without collapsing it into rigid categories of right and wrong, us and them.
Ironically, although Buddhism is woven into the fabric of Bhutanese life, our education system largely overlooks it, favouring Western models that, while offering the strengths of analytical thinking, tend to prioritise competition, self-interest, and consumerism—the underlying drivers of global warming.
If Bhutan can bring the insights of the Dharma to the environmental debate while giving genuine expression to the original values of Gross National Happiness, we will carry far more weight in the world than our size would suggest. That may prove to be our greatest contribution.
But first, we must live these principles, not merely profess them. Before we think big, we must get the basics right by tackling everyday environmental issues such as single-use plastic and waste management.
Otherwise, can we credibly and honestly speak on the world stage about environmental protection when even the smallest purchase here is handed over in a single-use plastic bag, when potato chip and instant noodle packets litter our sacred sites, and when tsok offerings at monasteries are piled high with single-use water bottles and plastic-wrapped junk food?
Finally, practices such as chanting the Guru Rinpoche mantra or the Seven-Line Prayer are very effective in pacifying the elements and restoring balance to the natural world. This is possible because mind and world are inseparable: by transforming the mind, we transform the conditions from which our shared world arises.
