Haiti Anthropology Brief: Eight Questions About a Welfare System in Haiti

This post deals with the impact of a welfare system in Haiti. USAID, the World Bank, and WFP have proposed a type of welfare system for Haiti’s most vulnerable (see KORE LAVI program). While there are definitively many vulnerable people in Haiti, the idea of an institutionalized safety-net brings up questions that should be addressed. Read More

Goat Ethnographic Value Chain in Haiti

Using the MEVMS value chain research and presentation strategy described here, this paper provides a rapid summary of the goat value chain in rural Haiti. The research is based on literature review, focus groups and a 405 household survey in the Grand Anse conducted in January 2018 on behalf of Heks-Eper; focus groups key informantRead More

Artisanal Fish Ethnographic Value Chain in Haiti

As the Western third of the Caribbean’s second largest island, Haiti has a relatively small continental shelf surface area of 5,860 km2, approximately 20% the size of the entire country (27,750); but it has an exclusive economic zone (EEZ) of mostly deep-sea that is 86,398 km2, three times the country’s landmass and including what couldRead More

Industrial Fishing Value Chain in Haiti

Of the some 26,000 fishing vessels that were plying Haiti coast in 2018, only about 1,200 were involved in what can be called “industrial fishing strategies.” The reader should take note that this is distinct from the modern fisheries using megaton steel ships and massive nets with hydraulic powered wenches and onboard machine powered coldRead More

Formal Sector Egg Value Chain in Haiti

This paper focuses on formal egg production in Haiti. Data is drawn from a review of the literature and contact with farmers, entrepreneurs, merchants, and cooperative leaders. Current value of the Haitian egg market is 36 million USD per annum (MARNDR 2014). That translates to 41.2 million eggs per month; 6.45 million are produced inRead More

Chicken & Egg (Poultry) Ethnographic Value Chain in Haiti

This paper focuses on egg production in Haiti with an emphasis on popular class rural household livelihood strategies. Data is drawn from a review of the literature and contact with farmers, entrepreneurs, merchants, cooperative leaders, and two surveys: a 382 household “Chicken Survey” and a follow-up telephone sub-survey of 91 of the original respondents. ConstraintsRead More

History of Haiti’s Fabricated Rape Epidemics

In this article I begin with the rape epidemic that supposedly shook Haiti following the 2010 earthquake and then trace back in time the role of international aid agencies, activists, foreign governments, Haitian politicians and Haitian opportunist aid entrepreneurs in creating what has become an industry of being “viktim.”

Haiti Anthropology Brief: Origins of the Haitian Internal Rotating Market System

Haiti was born in the latter 18th and early 19th century when 500,000 slaves engaged in a 13-year struggle for freedom and independence that was arguably the deadliest conflict in world history. About half of both the civilian and combatant populations were killed. Many died violently, but a greater number fell ill and died fromRead More

Anthropological Brief: Understanding Infant Nutritional Challenges in Haiti

Infants in Haiti face an especially daunting set of nutritional challenges. The 1,000 days from conception to a child’s second birthday are the most critical period of a child’s physio-intellectual development. Children who are well nourished during this period become healthier and more intelligent adults who in turn are better able to feed and careRead More

Haiti Anthropological Brief: Myth of the Indiscriminate Haitian Charcoal Maker

A common myth often repeated among development experts working in Haiti is that the peasants cut their fruit trees for charcoal (see MIF 2010; USAID/WINNER 2015; TNS 2014; Davenport 2000:1). And they do. But what’s mythical is the implication that they are indiscriminately felling healthy and productive fruit trees. After seven years of researching factors thatRead More

Anthropology in Haiti