Ministry of Education and Skills Development (Bhutan)

The Ministry of Education and Skills Development (Dzongkha: ཤེས་རིག་དང་རིག་རྩལ་གོང་འཕེལ་ལྷན་ཁག, MoESD; sometimes branded "Sherig–MoESD") is the ministry of the Royal Government of Bhutan responsible for general school education, early childhood care and development (ECCD), monastic-school coordination at the secular interface, technical and vocational education and training (TVET), and overall tertiary-education policy. Its headquarters are in Thimphu.^[1]

The ministry took its current combined name in January 2024, when the cabinet of Prime Minister Tshering Tobgay merged the former Ministry of Education with the technical and vocational skills functions previously housed under labour and human resources. As of January 2024 the Minister is Her Excellency Lyonpo Yeezang De Thapa (also referred to in earlier official communications as Dimple Thapa), the only woman in the 2024 Tobgay cabinet, sworn in on 28 January 2024.^[2]

The ministry's stated mission is to provide equitable, quality, and inclusive education and lifelong-learning opportunities aligned with the country's development priorities under the 13th Five-Year Plan. It is the policy lead on the National Education Policy 2024 and on Bhutan's Education Bill, which has been before parliament in successive forms for over a decade and remains pending statute.^[3]

Portfolio

The ministry's portfolio covers ECCD centres, primary and secondary schools (including the network of central schools that provide hostel facilities to students from rural areas), the country's TVET institutes, and the policy framework for tertiary education. It works closely with the autonomous Royal University of Bhutan, which administers most public higher-education campuses, and with the Royal Education Council on curriculum development. Curriculum reform under the Education Reform Council was launched to better align school content with twenty-first-century skills.^[4]

The ministry also administers Bhutan's external-scholarship programmes for tertiary students, including programmes funded by India, Australia, the United Kingdom, and Japan, and operates non-formal education (NFE) and continuing-education programmes through district offices.

National Education Policy 2024

The National Education Policy 2024 was submitted to the cabinet in 2024 and presented as the principal framework for the post-2024 reform programme. It covers ECCD, school education, TVET, and lifelong learning, and proposes greater school-level autonomy over budgets and human resources, a reduction in excess teacher workload, and reforms to central schools rather than the creation of new ones.^[5] The Education Technology Framework (ETF), launched on 11 July 2024, complements the policy with EU-funded support for digitalisation in education.^[6]

Workforce Pressures

The ministry faces a substantial workforce challenge driven by external migration. In 2024, almost 70 percent of all voluntary resignations from the civil service came from the education and health sectors, with education alone accounting for one-quarter of all migrants. In March 2025 the ministry announced plans to rehire retired or resigned teachers to fill 1,126 teaching vacancies, citing departures to higher education and employment abroad — most prominently to Australia — as the primary cause of the shortfall.^[7]

See Also

• Royal University of Bhutan
• Cabinet of Bhutan (Tshering Tobgay, 2024)
• Labour migration and brain drain in Bhutan

References

1. Sherig — Ministry of Education and Skills Development
2. His Majesty The King conferred Dakyen — Ministry of Foreign Affairs (28 January 2024)
3. National Education Policy 2024 submitted to Cabinet — BBS
4. Education Reform Council to revise curriculum for 21st Century skills development — BBS
5. National Education Policy 2024 — The Bhutanese
6. Ministry of Education and Skills Development (Bhutan) — Wikipedia
7. Bhutan's Australian Dream: Outmigration Reaches Critical Levels — Newsreel Asia