The Dashboard to Enhance Wellbeing of All, or DEWA in short, is an integrated platform to monitor and track the progress of Gross National Happiness (GNH), Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Five-Year Plans. The Prime Minister, Dasho Dr Lotay Tshering launched this data platform today.

The DEWA dashboard was developed by the Gross National Happiness Commission (GNHC) Secretariat in collaboration with the National Statistics Bureau (NSB) and support from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). It was developed as per the recommendation pertaining to the need for improvement of data availability as well as accessibility outlined in Bhutan’s first Voluntary National Review Report on the Implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. 

In many countries, such a dashboard is commonly known as SDG Dashboard or SDG Tracker. Bhutan chose to integrate its GNH indicators and Five-Year Plan’s key result areas in addition to SDGs in this one-stop dashboard and has named it as DEWA, which means wellbeing in Dzongkha.

Gauging the wellbeing, progress and status of Bhutan’s socio-economic development

This common integrated platform will provide online - both web-based and mobile app, progress and status of Bhutan’s socio-economic development. Any interested organization and individual can view and visualize development progress of Bhutan through the lens of the development frameworks of GNH, SDGs and FYP. It aims to provide:

• an integrated socio-economic development related data which will be based on different set of indicators of the government’s 12th FYP, SDGs and GNH
• easy access to development progress and status through Mobile Apps (android and IOS) based on DEWA portal
• Common GIS interface platform for Geo spatial analysis and District (Dzongkhag), Constituency (Demkhong), Block (Gewog) and Sub-block (chiwog) wise data visualization.
  

DEWA will help improve the country’s overall data ecosystem by making relevant data, including administrative data available in a timely manner. This will aid evidence-based planning and policy formulation in the country. The DEWA dashboard will also serve as a monitoring tool for all development plans and programmes in the country.

Prime Minister Dr. Lotay Tshering said that now there is a dashboard in place, concerted efforts must be made to ensure it serves its intended purpose. The Secretary of GNHC Thinley Namgyel said the dashboard will go a long way in ensuring reliable and timely data for socio-economic development.

UNDP Resident Representative (RR) Azusa Kubota said UNDP hopes that DEWA would play a catalytic role in improving data accessibility for all who must make critical decisions daily. “We are confident that the DEWA would be indispensable for effective planning, monitoring and evaluation with a view to achieving SDGs, the Five-Year Plan goals, and Gross National Happiness (GNH),” she said. 

UNDP RR urged concerned institutions to show ownership of relevant indicators and share data in a timely manner so that data availability and accessibility will continuously improve.

“UNDP remains committed to supporting national efforts to improve data ecosystem and evidence-base for decision-making. Given the level of ambition enshrined in the Agenda 2030, there is a need for great statistical capacity, not only to generate data periodically and real-time, but also to enhance the utility of data in policies and programmes.” 

For media inquiries, please contact:

Mr. Phurba, Gross National Happiness Commission Secretariat , Mobile: +975 1739 7725, Tel: +975 325852;  Email: phurba@gnhc.gov.bt

Ms. Dechen Wangmo, Communications Analyst, UNDP Bhutan, Mobile: +975 1734 3086, Email: dechen.wangmo@undp.org

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