Street Food in Haiti

This article describes and attempts to explain the recent growth in Haiti’s street food cottage industries. Underlying the growth in street foods is urbanization and challenges that come with it. The challenges can be summed up as, “The Food Preparation Conundrum,” which can be further broken down into problems that the the street food industryRead More

Prepackaged Industrial Snack Food Industry in Haiti

Imported snack foods are another solution to what I have defined elsewhere as the Food Preparation Conundrum (The Storage problem, The Water Problem, The Fuel Problem, The Labor Problem) that has come about with rapid urbanization of the past 50 years. They are inexpensive, ready to eat, available everywhere, have a long shelf-life and areRead More

Fair Wage in Haiti (Academic Version)

First published as a report commissioned by the ITC (International Trade Center/Ethical Fashion Initiative, November 2012) INTRODUCTION This white paper examines the concept of a “fair wage” in the context of the cost of living and the prevailing wage scale within in Haiti. It concludes with a recommended wage scale for the artisan sector. FAIRRead More

Fair Wages in Haiti (Short Version)

Fallacies In understanding a “fair wage” a couple fallacies should be recognized. First, official unemployment rates for Haiti vary between 70 to 80 percent. Similarly, organizations such as the World Bank have estimated that over 50% of the Haitian population lives on less than $1 per day and as much as 80% lives on lessRead More

Irony of the Exports: Superiority of the Local Market for Haitian Mangoes

A closer look at evidence and trends in the market suggests that the local market for mangos is better than that of the export market. It offers producers more money. Indeed, to get mangos from producers, the exporters, their voltije and fourniseur agents have to resort to trickery and financial advances on trees 9 monthsRead More

Belying Basket of Mango: TRAVESTY OF EXPORT VS. LOCAL MANGO PRICES Part II

If we consider the value of a panye (basket) in terms of a poor market woman selling mangoes in the local market, where 95% or more of all Haiti’s mangos get sold, there is clearly a price floor at which point it makes no sense to harvest and sell mangos. There is a point whereRead More

Cheaper by the Dozen Mango Travesty II

Puzzling regarding change in prices, size of dozens and reject rates is that HAP made claims in 2005 almost identical to those of Haiti Hope project claims in 2014 and 2015. Quoting directly from the HAP 2005 evaluation, Field interviews indicated that ten years ago producers were paid four gourdes for a dozen mangos, andRead More

Cheaper by the Dozen Mango Travesty I

It is not at all what NGOs or Haitians mean–any of them—when they say “dozen.” Not those in the mango business anyway. First off, for the poor Haitian producers, they do not measure in weight and they seldom measure in number. They measure in volume. Hence when trading locally in mangos they do not useRead More

Haiti, Not Open for Business: Another Dried Mango Export Travesty

Despite a whole lot promises and some $120 million donor dollars invested in the domestic mango industry over a period of 20 years, as of 2015, Haiti had no new mango processing facilities. A 2012 TNS feasibility study showed that a Coca Cola supported juice and pulp processing factory would be profitable only after 10Read More

Lying Sack of Mango: Travesty of Export Prices

This article summarizes how USG funded aid agencies and contractors have manipulated price data to make it appear that they have improved the export market chain price for mangoes. As seen below, they’ve rather boldly misrepresented their own data to make their case.

Ethnography