Tibet: A Human Development and Environment Report, 2007

10 December 2007
Press Statement

Environment and Development Desk of the Department of Information and International Relations, Central Tibetan Administration is happy to launch its third comprehensive report in its series, titled "Tibet: A Human Development and Environment Report, 2007". This report offers a broad perspective on contemporary Tibet. The well-being of the Tibetan people, and well-being of the land, are assessed, making use of all available information.

The findings of this report are disturbing in many ways. There is widespread degradation of grasslands. Nomadic livelihoods are constricted by increasing bureaucratic regulation and exclusion. Tibetans suffer from high level of illiteracy and social exclusion from modern skills. Tibetans also suffer from chronic marginalisation, unemployment and under-employment. Tibetans suffer from lack of basic services, even drinkable water in the countryside. Tibetans are overwhelmed by flood of tourists and subsidised immigration.

Taken together this is a long list of serious impacts on both land and people. The result is that Tibet is far from attaining the Millennium Development Goals, now or by 2015. The official goals of the Chinese central leaders, for five decades, have been development, pillar industries, economic take-off, productivity and prosperity. The actual result is enclaves of wealth surrounded by a neglected, eroding countryside; islands of privilege in a grassy sea of deprivation, illiteracy and exclusion. The pillar industries failed to materialise, inequality has become extreme, economic take-off never happened. Tibet remains one of the poorest of subsistence societies, its Human Development Indicators equivalent to some of the poorest countries on earth.

Human development and environmental impacts are the two frameworks of this report, enabling the reader to look at land and people together. This is how Tibetans see the world, with humans as one among myriad mind-possessing species, but with special responsibilities of care and stewardship. The combination of land and people, environment and human development, throughout this report, is a reminder that solutions to the problems of past policy mistakes require the active involvement of the Tibetan people, not their exclusion.

We can look to the future with hope, because examples from many places show us new ways of building sustainable livelihoods, sustainable biodiversity and environments. Past mistakes can be rectified by adopting more advanced and inclusive methods of repairing the degraded grasslands as a partnership between leaders and the people. Skilful advanced methods of co-management are possible, with local communities as equal partners. This begins with listening to the farmers and pastoral nomads of Tibet, respecting their intimate knowledge of landscapes and how to effectively care for them. This is what has been missing, for 50 years, in the statist, top-down approach to development, with its emphasis on heavy infrastructure. Tibetan civil society can be empowered, its modern skills enhanced. The popular Tibetan willingness to participate as equals in ecological repair can be a key to watershed protection and successful reforestation.

Tibet, the source of most of Asia’s rivers, and driver of the Asian monsoons, is a key part of an interdependent world. The future human development of Tibet, biodiversity conservation, grassland repair and watershed protection can be achieved. This will involve skilful new participatory methods, and assistance from organisations around the world that can demonstrate advanced methods of enhancing human capabilities. This report is particularly addressed to the development agencies and environmental organisations, inviting them to bring their best practice standards to Tibet, to show in practice how local communities can ensure appropriate results. To assist them, this report concludes with Guidelines that articulate what Tibetans need and seek, from international agencies and investors who come to Tibet.

This report offers a balance of alarm and hope; failures and new possibilities; unintended consequences and fresh opportunities; past damage and specific case studies of skilful new directions. The purpose is to look ahead, to a future in which Tibetan voices are no longer ignored and excluded, not only for the sake of Tibet, but also for the sake of a world that needs the many environmental services Tibet provides. Future provision of those precious services is guaranteed only if Tibetan environments are sustainable, and not exploited excessively. The world has an interest in the long-term sustainability of the environmental benefits that come from Tibet. China has especial reason to carefully reconsider how to skilfully reforest Tibet, conserve watersheds and win the respect of the people, by adopting advanced methods. This report is an invitation to a new beginning.

The Department of Information and International Relations' first environment and development report was released in 1992 at the Rio Earth Summit. The second report was released in 2000. Together these three reports constitute a wake-up call for people in Asia to discover what China is up to in Tibet.

Issued by:
Environment and Development Desk,
Department of Information and International Relations,
Central Tibetan Administration, Dharamsala

  (www.tibet.net is the official website of the Central Tibetan Administration of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.)