A Place to Lay One's Head

Back in February I posted that the Government of Haiti had secured 5 parcels of land from private land owners; well almost 3 months later only one parcel of land, Corail Cesselesse, which is about 18,000 acres. It has been outfitted and prepared for new residents, roughly 6,000 families. Aid groups complained that it was ill organized, they only had a week to build the temporary settlement and outfit it with water spigots and latrines. There have been calls for a more organized plan with the establishment of the 4 other sites.
But problems and questions remain. There are some 250,000 residents in need of shelter but the land secured can only accommodate about half of them. Aid groups are calling on the government to utilize eminent domain and quickly. The rainy season is HERE. Many people are living in flood prone zones and to make matters worst tensions are rising. The homeless are residing on private lands, some have been threatened with eviction and some are living on school grounds were administrators, teachers and students alike are eager to resume classes to get back to a "normal life." Its clear that an easy fix is not apparent to decision makers. It is hard to predict what will happen next,however my guess is people will languish in the flimsy camps in harms way for many more weeks to come. Let us hope I am wrong.

Jobs, Jobs, Jobs

Haiti has a very large unemployed population. There simply are not enough jobs to employ the population, but the population is willing and motivated. If Haitians had jobs they would be able to provide for themselves and their families. Its not rocket science. The challenge or opportunity (depending on how you see it) is to create long term employment opportunities that can generate income for Haitians, across multiple sectors. There is growing interest in the textile and manufacturing sector. Haiti has duty free access to the US market through the Haitian Hemispheric Opportunity through Partnership Encouragement Act of 2006 and 2008 respectively HOPE and HOPE II.

The challenge has always been how do you drum up support for a country like Haiti? To the unfamiliar its a diseased, poor and corrupt country with a long history of political and social instability. Investors are looking for safe and secure and therefore have been reluctant to invest. But the country might be poised to make a come back at least in textiles. Companies like the Gap and a new company that sprang up on Facebook Choose Haiti wants to convince consumers and large retailers that Haiti is worthy of their dollars and a great place for business. Haiti will obviously need more than factories to lift itself out of poverty but if other major companies join the ranks, its potential impact of the island is huge!

Aid will not last forever and donor fatigue is bound to happen. If factories can resume production and more investors can be convinced that Haiti is good for business, we just might have a winner on our hands.