The Boston Globe today reports that since the January earthquake, 1.8 billion dolars has been given to Haiti…and the place is still a dump. My question: where has all of this money gone to? If we assume that the Haitians are willing to work for short money (per capita GNP is about $600/year), than this money should have bought a lot of labor-so why isn’t anything being done? The article decribes :
-unsafe drinking water
-open air sewage
-washed out roads
I don’t get it…can’t they at least drill some well? Or build latrines?
I would like to see an analysis of just what the Haitian governnment does with donated funds…I suspect a lot winds up in Switzerland.
I suspect you’re right. The place is known for one of the most corrupt governments in the world. I can’t help but think that some of the people in charge looked at the earthquake as a godsend, because they knew that money by the bucketload would soon be flowing into their country, and they could get super-rich by just skimming off a little bit.
Haiti already had a water shortage, way before the earthquake.
Take a city that was already fucked. Fuck it up even more, beyond belief. Destroy what little infrastructure there was, add collapsed and unsafe buildings everywhere, mash up the aquifers, some of which will be poisoned. Hundreds of thousands of injured or able bodied people living outside the city in tented villages. Add to that the rainy season, flash flooding, disease, and mental trauma.
I’m not doubting that there is corruption, but do you seriously think a mere $1.8 billion would fix the issues above anywhere in the world, let alone one with Haiti’s extant problems? In six months? You have got to be kidding. It’s going to take decades.
And most promised aid does not turn up. For instance the Bam earthquake, the Kashmir quake, the 2005 Indian Ocean Tsunami.
The problem is that the people who hold the power aren’t necessarily the best people to rebuild an island.
It’s not like we can dump 1,000 of our best city planners, engineers and construction workers on the island and let them go to town. Though a leader would commission just such a team.
-unsafe drinking water
-open air sewage
-washed out roads
Haiti had all that before the earthquake, it ain’t gonna get much better.
How far does 1.8 billion go these days?
A blogger I subscribe to just went to Haiti for a couple of weeks to teach gardening. The way she told it, you have to imagine everything as being as difficult and slow as possible, only more difficult than that. A simple task like getting a couple of buckets to an orphanage was an all-day job that might not succeed at all. Transporting large amounts of stuff (say, a pile of boards) was well-nigh impossible–it’s not like you could put it in a pickup truck and drive across town.
The chaos, poverty, and lack of infrastructure is pretty well unimaginable to most of us, and the problems are so deep that it would take decades to fix. Even in a perfect ideal world, you couldn’t fix Haiti in a year.
The new Cowboys Stadium cost $1.3B.
There is effectively no government left in Haiti. Whatever infrastructure and record-keeping they had was destroyed. Even if sending $2 billion would be sufficient to create drinking water, sewage, and road infrastructure somewhere in Haiti, you will be able to find some place without those things. Come on, there are places in the United States without those things.
I don’t know why we’re bothering to answer this to be honest. Going on posting history I believe ralph124c operates generally with a somewhat insular comprehension of the world. Add to that a dearth of intellectual agility, and a curmudgeonly attitude towards such matters, and you get an OP like the one above, where it’s strongly implied that $1.8 billion is enough and people should be able to fix stuff up and hey it’s probably because those dumb Haitians are stealing the money anyway.
ETA: or to put it another way, in terms that maybe Ralph can get, how much do you think it would cost to fix Detroit? What if most of Detroit had fallen over? How long would that take to do?
A few months ago I was in New Orleans and rented a car to drive through the city. I made my way through district 9 which was and is one of the poorest sections of NOLA and also one of the hardest hit by Katrina. There are still neighborhoods with crumbled houses. There are still houses with spray paint across the doors saying things like “Dead Dog inside!” and other markings made either by the former residents or the FEMA hazmat unit going around the check the place out. Not to mention the surrounding swampland still litered with boats and houses because, despite the combined efforts of even the residents living in the area not all of it has been picked up yet.
Donations to Katrina approached $4 billion which is on top of what government assistance was provided. It’s in the USA which is a first world nation and, while our government isn’t perfect, it’s not in the same league as the skimming of funds from Haitian government or African warlords.
So what happened there?
Well, then, don’t answer – but also don’t come in and insult the OP. If you have a problem with him, take it to the Pit.
No warning issued.
twickster, MPSIMS moderator
Sorry. I know several people who have been working over there and have returned and described the conditions with a faraway look in their eyes. It amazed me that such a question as the one in the OP should be asked, but I do withdraw the implicit insults in my rhetoric.
I recommend that interested people read this article by AA Gill, which, although written two and a half months ago, gives a very pointed (and deeply harrowing) description of the starting point for rebuilding.
With a population of about 9 million, $1.8B would have bought just 4 months’ labor from everybody there. That assumes none of the donated money gets spent on supplies (emergency food, water, medical supplies, tents, etc.) and on the transportation to get those supplies (and relief workers) where they need to go; this is actually where a great deal of the donated funds probably end up getting spent. It also assumes that a government/logistical network exists that can recruit and direct that labor force in an effective manner, which just ain’t so; the government was ineffective even before the earthquake decimated it.
Don’t know where you got your numbers, but according to Wikipedia, considerably more than $1.8B has been donated, with most of it spent on emergency supplies. The government of Haiti, such as is is, claims that its main effort right now is to deal with hurricane season, although it’s not specified exactly what they’re doing in that regard.
Another issue is land ownership. Most residents didn’t own their homes to begin with, so rebuilding isn’t up to them. In cases where they do claim ownership, it may not be a matter of official record, which complicates rebuilding efforts.
I think this is going to be the most relevant post here. Expecting the money we sometimes spend on a single building to fix a country of 10 million people is silly.
The article mentions that trash collection, sewage disposal, and water is a big problem. How hard is it to organize some rudimentary trash collection? Drilling a few wells also doesn’t take 6 months to do; likewise digging latrines.
I suspect most of this “aid” is paid out to aid workers, rather than directly applied…I’m thinking of 200 page studies and reports, proposals, etc.
Drilling a few wells?
Are you serious?
When there are few if any reliable roads, or vehicles, or maintenance facilities, or fuel depots? Or reliable staff not suffering from malnutrition, homelessness, or dealing with family tragedies?
And once those wells are drilled, how do you distribute it?
Do you understand how complex our society is and how many interdependent factors there are?
Because it costs a lot more that $1.8 billion and takes a lot longer than seven months to fix something of this magnitude. Especially when you take into consideration the dire situation Haiti was in even before the earthquake.
That’s why it’s still messed up.
This question is unbelievably naive. You didn’t actually think seven months was going to be enough time to get Haiti in tip top shape, did you? In the Bay Area, where I grew up, it took years and years to finish rebuilding things that were destroyed in the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, and the damage that caused was mild compared to what happened in Haiti, not to mention financial resources and infrastructure were about a billion times better. Depending on how you want to think about it, you could even make a case that the rebuilding is still going on (with the building of the new Bay Bridge).
Americans rebuild like this. Haitians rebuild like this.