As discussed earlier in the report, the region of Gelephu by the virtue of its locational geography and its physiographic character holds a great potential for future development. The Ministry of Trade and Industries and the Ministry of Information and Communications, have already conceptualized developmental activities in the region including an industrial estate and an international airport. His Holiness Je Khenpo’s prophecy of performing meditation and constructing a Stupa of 300 feet height and 700 feet diameter in Fulahari further adds up to the development potential of the region as a religious nerve centre for the nation’s southern region.
Though some of these activities have not been finalized and a detailed study is yet to be carried out by the government, it will be wise to plan for these activities in the future given the economic and development potential of the region. With the upcoming proposal of Sibsu-Daipham National Highway there is an immense potential for Gelephu forming a south central entrance gateway to the Kingdom. In the future, with the improvement of infrastructure facilities and the town’s image, there is possibility for conceptualizing a Special Economic Zone in the region.
Gelephu can be developed as one of the Growth Centers in the country with facilities including transportation hub, dry-port and economic zones. Just as it would be inappropriate to base the future of the town and its population on the assumption that all such kinds of activity would take place, it would also be unwise to rule out such opportunities and potential the region offers. In order to arrive into a rational way of projecting the population of the town for another twenty years time, some possible scenarios for development of Gelephu were assumed and accordingly the population projection has been worked on.
The Gross Residential Density of the Gelephu Municipal Limit for the year 2002 was 19 persons per hectare with a major concentration of residential population living in the Town Core area.
In the exercise of population projection, understanding the past population growth trend of the town becomes very crucial, since this data will act as the base for future projection. However, due to the non-availability of any established population data for Gelephu town for over past one and half decades, the population data provided in the 1986 Urban Development Plan for Gelephu has been considered as the base datum. The population of Gelephu was calculated to be 4,844 people with an institutional population of 877 during May 1984, and 5,167 with an institutional population of 788 during October 1986, in the surveys conducted by the National Urban Development Commission. The population growth rate between these two surveys remained around 4% per annum. During this same period the population growth rate of Thimphu, Samdrup Jongkhar and Phuentsholing were calculated to be 5%, 3.5% and 6.3% per annum respectively.
4.9 GUIDING PRINCIPLES TO DETERMINE THE DEVELOPMENT SCENARIOS
The following are the guiding principles adopted, for deriving the possible alternative development scenarios for the town of Gelephu;
The government’s initiatives and policies on incentives and investments for the growth and development of the town and the region are of crucial importance towards determining the alternative development scenario.