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MIAMI — The crew of the Coast Guard Cutter Tahoma aboard the Coast Guard Cutter Bear repatriated 164 Haitian migrants to Cap Haitien, Haiti, this week.
Watchstanders at the Seventh Coast Guard District command center received notification of a grossly overloaded 40-foot sail freighter southwest of Long Island, Bahamas, Jan. 4, 2013. Once the Bear arrived on scene, the crew safely embarked the migrants and repatriated them Thursday.
Once aboard a Coast Guard cutter, all migrants are provided with food, water, shelter and basic medical attention.
"The patrol presence of our cutters in the Caribbean continues to prevent the potential loss of life that has occurred too many times when grossly overloaded vessels take to the sea in an attempt to illegally migrate to the United States," said Cmdr. Timothy Cronin, Seventh Coast Guard District, Assistant Branch Chief for Enforcement. "Coat Guard Alien Migrant Interdiction Operations protect our borders from illicit activity, but they also highlight the humanitarian side of our service. The Coast Guard will continue to rescue Haitian migrants from their peril at sea and will always do so in a professional manner that preserves the dignity of all people."
The Tahoma's crew were operating aboard the Bear as the Tahoma undergoes a nine-month overhaul at the Coast Guard Yard in Baltimore as part of Coast Guard’s Mission Effectiveness Project.
The Bear, Tahoma and other medium endurance cutters are slated for replacement by an Offshore Patrol Cutter. The new OPCs will operate more than 50 miles from land, carrying out the Coast Guard's maritime security and safety activities in support of national interests. The OPC will be an economical, multi-mission ship, providing pursuit boat and helicopter capabilities and interoperability with other military and federal partners, superior to the cutters they replace. Equipped with modern sensors, the Offshore Patrol Cutter will provide the enhanced surveillance necessary to detect threats far from U.S. shores and meet the demands of the Coast Guard’s homeland security, search and rescue, law enforcement and other vital missions.
The Coast Guard Cutter Bear is homeported in Portsmouth, VA.
The Coast Guard Cutter Tahoma is homeported in Kittery, ME
MSC HAS sued Florida’s Bernuth Lines, seeking $4.2M related to the 2010 sinking of the box ship Angeln. While on sub-charter to Bernuth, the 8,329dwt, 2004-built ship – owned by Angeln GmbH ...
with video!!Bernuth charter Angeln awash off St. Lucia- update The tropical paradise of St. Lucia is dealing with the aftermath of the 6704 GT container ship ANGELN (IMO: 9298600) which capsized and partially sank just off the island’s ...
To: Our esteemed clients, providers, agents, and representatives
Ref: New Business Announcement
King Ocean Services Ltd. is very pleased to announce the addition of Bernuth Lines Limited to our existing group of services on September 7, 2012. We believe the addition of Bernuth Lines immediately strengthens our company's position in the local shipping market and adds a long line of shipping success to our current book of business. We will now be able to offer clients a one-stop provider for shipping needs all over the Caribbean Sea and we know this move will greatly increase Bernuth's current workforce, efficiency, and customer service capabilities. Needless to say, the King Ocean group is very excited and is looking forward to building on the formidable history and culture of service and operation that Bernuth Lines has established in the Caribbean over the last three decades. The markets Bernuth services at the moment are: St. Maarten, Anguilla, Barbados, Dominica, St. Kitts, Nevis, Montserrat, St. Barths, Grenada, St. Vincent, St. Lucia, Trinidad, Guyana, Suriname, the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, San Andres (Colombia). In order to facilitate the transition for the customer both in the United States and abroad, Bernuth will continue to operate under the name Bernuth Lines Limited for the time being.
Furthermore, current Bernuth markets and routes will continue to operate as planned without any interruption to the service. It is our immediate intention to build on this formidable book of business in the near future without any radical changes for both Bernuth and King Ocean customers. As with all complicated business transactions, continuity is of highest importance to us at this time. Our new team will work closely with all clients, providers, agents, representatives, and employees to make this integration as seamless as possible. Please feel free contact us should you have any comments or questions regarding how this news will affect your business with us. We thank you for your continued support and cooperation and look forward to achieving our goals together through this new venture.
Becker Developing LNG Barge for Cruise Vessels in Port
Tuesday, 28 August 2012
Together with AIDA Cruises, Becker Marine Systems has developed an environmentally-friendly solution for supplying power to cruise ships lying in port: the LNG Hybrid Barge.
In close cooperation with AIDA Cruises, one of the leading cruise lines in matters of environmental technology, and partners SCHRAMM group GmbH & Co. KG, Ingo Schlüter GmbH & Co. KG, EON Hanse Wärme GmbH, Bureau Veritas as well as Gasnor AS, Becker Marine Systems has developed the LNG Hybrid Barge as an environmentally-friendly and low emission solution for supplying power to cruise ships in port.
Currently, cruise ships n port generate the energy required for onboard operation by using the ships’ diesel engines.
The use of these engines results in a high level of pollution containing harmful and airborne substances in the form of soot particles.
The new concept solves this problem by producing energy on the floating LNG Hybrid Barge from environmentally-friendly liquefied natural gas (LNG) by means of 5 generators coupled to combined heat and power engines.
The power generated can be fed into the supply grid of the cruise ship as needed.
The liquefied natural gas is delivered in modular form, because this is less expensive than bunkering.
A LNG Bunker Station, ensuring supply at all times, is being built in Bruns büttel by SCHRAMM group GmbH & Co.KG. Schramm group will also be the operator of the LNG Hybrid Barge at the Hamburg port.
The use of the LNG Hybrid Barge will significantly reduce particle emissions during port sojourns. In contrast to the diesel engines currently in use, sulphur oxides (SOX) will no longer be produced during port layovers.
The emission of nitrogen oxides (NOX) will be lowered by up to 80 % and the output of carbon dioxide by an additional 30 %.Another benefit is the year-round utilization of the system.
The Hamburg energy provider, EON Hanse Wärme GmbH, is planning to feed the energy produced in the cruise off-season into the municipal grid, thus supplying electricity and heat to approx. 11,000 households (based on 4-person households).In autumn 2013 the AIDAsol should be the first cruise ship in the world to be supplied with electricity by Becker Marine Systems’ LNG Hybrid Barge at Hamburg’s HafenCity
May 28, 2012
Haiti faces 30-year recovery: U.S. official
Mike Blanchfield, The Canadian Press
Sunday, May 27, 2012 - 20:15
People walk inside the Jean Marie Vincent camp for people displaced by the devastating 2010 earthquake in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, on May 10, 2012. It will take Haiti the better part three decades to become a middle income country on par with its Caribbean island neighbour, the Dominican Republic, says the top U.S. official on the file. THE CANADIAN PRESS/AP - Dieu Nalio Chery
OTTAWA - It will take Haiti the better part of three decades to become a middle income country on par with its Caribbean island neighbour, the Dominican Republic, says the top U.S. official on the file.
But Thomas Adams, the State Department's special co-ordinator for Haiti, told The Canadian Press that "realistic" estimate should not be seen as daunting to countries like Canada that are heavily invested in helping the Western Hemisphere's poorest country, still struggling after its devastating 2010 earthquake.
Nor should it deter investors, who are crucial to Haiti's long-term recovery, Adams added, as long as the country builds credible democratic institutions.
"There is no reason why Haiti can't become a middle income country. But because they're starting so low, it's going be to be 25-30 years even if they have good economic growth," Adams said in an exclusive interview, after two days of meetings in Ottawa with various government officials.
"It's not a quick fix. These problems in Haiti - their educational system, their health system, cholera, the infrastructure - these aren't quick fixes," he added.
"It's good to be realistic. That's not to say we're not making progress each year … But overall, you're not going to see a Haiti the way you'd like it for a while."
Forty years ago, Haiti was slightly ahead of the Dominican Republic economically, said Adams, with 20 large American corporations setting up their Caribbean headquarters there. The two countries share the Caribbean island of Hispaniola.
Adams sees economic growth for Haiti in textiles, agriculture and tourism.
"Haiti needs private investment. All the donor money, as generous as it is - and I think Canada and a lot of countries have been very generous - isn't enough to fix Haiti."
The U.S. and Canada, said Adams, remain in lock-step when it comes to helping Haiti recover from the devastating January 2010 earthquake that left 300,000 dead and displaced 1.5 million. Canada has pledged more than $1 billion to Haiti, making it the second largest aid recipient after Afghanistan.
That co-operation extends to co-ordinated messaging of Haiti's political leaders, to break the political paralysis of the last year - a crisis that has raised serious questions about the country's ability to stave off corruption and govern itself effectively.
That crisis appeared to ease earlier this month when President Michel Martelly swore in a new prime minister, Laurent Lamothe, whose predecessor resigned in February after barely four months on the job.
The turmoil rendered Haiti's government rudderless and left billions of dollars of donor pledges in limbo.
"That's pretty much over," said Adams. "There's a truce between the president and the parliament. It seems they're willing to work together. The president has confidence in the new prime minister."
With Lamothe confirmed, parliamentary amendments will pave the way for elections of senators and local officials, as well as paving the way for reforms of the court system, said Adams.
Throughout it all, the Canadian and U.S. governments have continued to "give co-ordinated messages on some sensitive topics."
The underlying message can be boiled down to this: reign in the corruption and work together politically.
"That's one of our constant messages," Adams explained.
"We don't say, if you're not going to do X, Y, and Z we're going to cut off all of your aid. But we do say, and Canada says, and everybody else says, over time businessmen and donors are going to go elsewhere if you're not seen as making your best efforts to curb corruption to bring in the rule of the law and be democratic.
"I think they're hearing that."
Diane Ablonczy, Canada's junior foreign affairs for the Americas, said Haitians are "crying out for leadership" so Canada is urging its leaders to step up and provide it.
"We are really urging the new government as its formed to emphasize and really roll up its sleeves and emphasize the need to deliver results for strong institutions in Haiti."
Adams also lauded Canada's former governor general, Haitian-born Michaelle Jean, as a key player in that co-ordinated communication effort with Haiti's leadership.
Jean, now the UNESCO Special Envoy for Haiti, travels to Haiti again this week, for meetings will political leaders. She'll also take part in events to highlight programs that help curb malnutrition and poverty.
Earlier this month, Jean laid bare her frustration with the pace of change in her native country during a recent speech in Ottawa to government officials and non-governmental organizations.
"The aid and handout system has become kind of a business model, a scheme used by some to wheel and deal as it generates opportunities for embezzlement and corruption," Jean said the text posted on her website.
"It can't go on like this."
Adams said that's the message the U.S., Canada and other allies continue to deliver to Haiti.
"We're on the same message too. Again, cut the chaos," he said. "That's all we're saying there: come on guys, let's keep our eye on the ball here."
The two former Superferries that failed because of Jones Act costs operating among the Hawaiian Islands have been acquired by taxpayers and provided to the US Navy and renamed after Jones Act ports.
The Alakai is now USNS Puerto Rico and the Huakai is now USNS Guam. Whoopee.
Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus says the high speed ferries "will be used for peacetime operations such as troop transport training, exercise missions and humanitarian and disaster relief."
The ferries are currently being modified to support military operations and to increase their endurance by installing crew berthing, sewage treatment plants and water-making equipment.
Let’s hope Congressperson Ileana Ros Lehtinen and Senator Bill Nelson jump on this opportunity to base at least one of these giant, high speed transports in Florida, either Key West or Jacksonville where they can be on hand for emergency missions in the Caribbean or, ultimately when the US government begins massive humanitarian relief to Cuba after the post Castro riots and recriminations subside.
Haitian President Michel Martelly expressed “satisfaction” at the Senate’s approval Tuesday night of Foreign Minister Laurent Lamothe as the country’s next Prime Minister, according to spokesperson Lucien Jura.
Lamothe received 19 votes in favour, three against and one abstention in a vote held Tuesday evening.
Lamothe still requires approval by the Chamber of Deputies; Martelly urged members of Haiti’s 49th Legislature to go in the same direction as their Senate colleagues.
Conille had received a 17-3 vote of approval by the Senate when confirmed in September.
Martelly is keen on a new government being established soon to cope with the challenges currently facing the country, Jura said.
Lamothe was nominated following the resignation of former Prime Minister Garry Conille, who left office in February.
He was previously the CEO and founder of telecom firm Global Voice Group.
An estimated 50,000 Haitians set up camp on Port-au-Prince Golf Grounds
After the Caribbean fault lines ripped apart Port-au-Prince, one of the poorest and most densely populated capital cities in the world, over two years ago, Haiti became the recipient of the most generous outpouring of solidarity in the form of disaster relief donations in the history of the United States. One out of every two American households gave a stunning $1.4 billion to a total of 23 major charities, and the international community came together pledging an unprecedented $5 billion – the largest pot of post-disaster reconstruction money ever.
‘People [in Haiti] are very poor, but they’re not stupid. They’re very, very aware that the money was raised with their suffering and their poverty and it’s not being spent on them.’ Linda Polman, journalist and author.
Here’s the catch: The vast majority of the jackpot was not donated directly to the Haitian people or their elected government, but rather to a proliferation of international NGOs with sophisticated PR apparatuses whose urgent emotional appeals, user friendly donation methods and humanitarian brands made them seem like the natural broker of the emergency aid funds.
The film Haiti: Where did the Money Go? has been aired on dozens of PBS channels across the US, on Capitol hill, in tent camps of Haiti and will today be screened at University of London Union (ULU), tomorrow in Oxford and should be available online in the coming weeks. Though it’s not the most in-depth piece of reporting on post-earthquake accountability in Haiti, and glosses over the country’s complicated history with NGOs, the film’s naiveté does an excellent job of communicating the shocking disparity between the outpouring of money and what’s actually spent on emergency relief for victims of the quake. More importantly, the wide-reach of PBS broadcast has sparked a much-needed debate on the transparency and effectiveness NGOs, which Haiti advocates and the congressional black caucus hope will lead to a congressional inquiry into the work of big NGOs.
A storm of criticism
The American Red Cross and Catholic Relief Service, among those interviewed at length in the film, hit back at PBS criticising the film for “inaccuracies”, “false statements” and “distortions” but their statements have only backfired to reveal how little they actually knew about conditions on the ground.
“We could have been so much harder on the American Red Cross” filmmaker Michele Mitchell told The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, but rather than admitting any regret, says Mitchell “they went nuclear on us.” They would have been wiser to let the storm of criticism blow over, as their embarrassingly defensive reaction to the film has only confirmed the criticism that they’re more concerned about protecting their brand’s reputation than doing right by the intended beneficiaries of their aid.
During two visits to Haiti ten and twenty months after the earthquake, Mitchell interviews internally displaced camp residents, NGO spokespeople, aid workers, academics and human rights advocates, trying to track down the aid money in the tent camps where as many as 1.5 million displaced Haitians languished at the time.
Viewers accompany her through a visceral journey into a city that looks like it’s been shelled like “Beirut in the 70′s”, a city where the gagging stench of 6 latrines reveals them to be shared by 5,000 camp residents, where people often paid for their tarpaulins and were provided with water that made them sick.
Her first visit coincides with a period when Haiti was facing three full-blown humanitarian emergencies: post-earthquake internal displacement, the outbreak of cholera and hurricane Tomas. Though such simultaneous crises were unprecedented challenges for the UN and NGOs, they had 10 months to prepare for hurricane season and the high possibility of a cholera epidemic, and yet no plans were in place other than instructing camp residents to drop their tents and evacuate to higher ground as the hurricane passed.
Humanitarian code of conduct
There does exists a humanitarian code of conduct for the minimum needs of displaced populations, known as the SPHERE standards, however “there’s no legal requirement” to adhere, says Peter Walker of Tufts University who helped initiate the standard. Nor is there “an industry association that you’re a member of which requires you to deliver to those standard.” The SPHERE was never adhered to in Haiti and accountability often came down to the threat of bad press from journalists.
Haiti was famous for being the republic of NGOs and a graveyard of failed NGO projects even before the earthquake. In the aftermath, at the donor conference in New York where the international community came together to raise money to rebuild, “they swore on the graves of their mothers that this time it would be different” says Linda Polman, Dutch journalist and author whose caustic pen has produced several damning critiques of the NGO “aid caravan”, UN peacekeepers and the relief and reconstruction complex. “People are very poor, but they’re not stupid. They’re very, very aware that the money was raised with their suffering and their poverty and it’s not being spent on them.”
Most aid workers genuinely want to do good, but they also want to have a good time and don’t want to forsake their first world living standards, unfortunately that can look offensive, wasteful, parasitic to the victims on the ground whose tragedy pays their salary.
When asked where the money has gone one resident of an IDP camp says it has gone to “paying for beautiful hotels to sleep in.” The UN themselves say rents have gone up 300%. Mark Schuller, American Anthropologist at CUNY, who has conducted the most definitive field studies of aid in Haiti’s tent camps says “You can call it non-profiteering if you like, you can call it disaster capitalism if you like, but that’s what’s happening right now in Haiti.”
Across the street from a squalid camp where three latrines service an estimated 7, 000 people, fleets of white SUVs line the streets as aid workers and Haiti’s tiny elites frequent a luxury restaurant with an extensive wine menu, tuna tartar, escargot and New York steak at $34. Most aid workers genuinely want to do good, but they also want to have a good time and don’t want to forsake their first world living standards, unfortunately that can look offensive, wasteful, parasitic to the victims on the ground whose tragedy pays their salary.
The films biggest flaws are its over-reliance on American voices to tell of Haiti’s plight, only featuring Haitian voices as victims, while ignoring any Haitian government officials and their critiques of the relief effort. Limited by the time spent shooting on the ground, the film’s critique of NGOs perhaps doesn’t go far enough, but its mainstream reach is bringing under scrutiny the very important topic of disaster and aid accountability.
Haiti: Martelly Administration Launches Community-based Decentralization Program
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti - The government of President Michel Martelly, working through the Ministry of Interior and local communities, today launched Katye Pam Pose (KPP), an innovative, community-based decentralization program.
Katye Pam Pose (KPP), which is the cornerstone of the Haitian government's National Decentralization Agenda, is focused on improving delivery of government services, as well as fostering development and job creation by promoting strong community involvement.
The overarching objectives of Katye Pam Pose are to bring decision-making closer to the citizen level; promote good governance; boost economic development and job creation; ensure the efficient delivery of public services; promote citizen safety, and accommodate the interests of diverse local interest groups.
According to Haiti's Minister of the Interior, Thierry Mayard-Paul, who will spearhead and coordinate the program nationwide, "Working community by community, Katye Pam Pose will guarantee access to basic social services and citizen safety to our people, which will lead to job creation and development."
Mayard-Paul explained that the launch of Katye Pam Pose will include a pilot program in 10 communities, representing all 10 departments. "That way, we can ensure that we address the specific needs of each community, under an integral and manageable framework, allowing us to make adjustments to enhance the program as it progresses," he said.
The range of actions within KPP include strengthening natural disaster mitigation efforts; improving the delivery of health, housing and education services; recover public spaces, develop local citizen initiatives and creating job opportunities in tandem with the private sector. "In the end, our goal is to improve the quality of life of the Haitian people by enabling safe and prosperous communities, right where they live," he said. "Building the capacity of citizens to manage and maintain KPP programs and infrastructure at the local level is very important to our administration, as is developing culture and sports programs. This is an ambitious decentralization program."
Broadly defined, decentralization is the process by which power and other resources are transferred from the central government to lower governmental levels, such as regions, departments, municipalities, and communal sections. This enables local entities to provide services to their communities and conduct local government tasks. According to Mayard-Paul, advocates believe that decentralization is one of the most effective ways to ensure that local governments are held accountable to the citizens they represent.
Mayard-Paul pointed out that Katye Pam Pose is a community-based program for decentralization modeled on successful experiences in other parts of the world, including Asia, the Americas, Africa, Europe and the United States. "However, it's a community-based model, a new and innovative Haitian approach to decentralization," he added.
"KPP pilot program in each of the 10 selected communities will be based on an in-depth participatory needs assessment diagnosis to ensure program implementation is prioritized by community need," said Mr. Mayard-Paul.
"Assessments will determine the level of impact, the feasibility of implementing each initiative and will make it possible for us to tailor pilot programs to each specific community based on the priorities identified."
The Ministry of the Interior is also identifying and exploring national and international partnerships, that could accelerate deployment of KPP.
"The government of Haiti is committed to the success of Katye Pam Pose," said Minister Mayard-Paul. "In implementing the program, I am committed to carrying out the vision of President Martelly and his administration, driving sustainable development and job creation at the local level."
“I am optimistic that in 18 months, yes, we will be autonomous in our decisions. But right now I have to assume... that we are not.”[i] With these words, Haiti’s Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive watched a swath of his government’s decision-making power shift into foreign hands in early 2010.
• Sign from a Port-au-Prince protest in October 2011, declaring “IHRC = Occupation. Long live a sovereign Haiti.” Photo: Ansel Herz. •
It's one thing to privatize government services. Since the earthquake, US firms have actually been involved in privatizing governance – in fact, the governance of another country. Corporations with little to no knowledge of Haiti were brought in as volunteers to plan, kick off, and even staff the team with the single greatest operational influence over shaping the reconstruction model for the year after the quake, the Interim Haiti Reconstruction Commission (IHRC).
The IHRC was created by the Haitian parliament in April 2010 to direct post-earthquake reconstruction. Its mandate was to oversee rebuilding efforts through the $11 billion in pledges of international aid, including approving policies, projects, and budgeting. The World Bank was to manage the money. In creating and investing this body with its broad power, Parliament conducted a constitutional coup on April 15. Whereas the constitution mandates shared governance by an executive, a parliament, and a judiciary, the IHRC shifted it to the executive and the international community. The Parliament voted to give the IHRC the power to do, effectively, whatever it wanted. The only oversight measure left the Haitian government was veto power by the president.[ii]
Given the corporate philosophies of the firms that designed it, the resultant features of the IHRC were hardly surprising. The IHRC’s 26 board members were elected by no one and were accountable to no one. Half were foreign, including representatives of other governments, multilateral financial institutions, and non-governmental organizations. An international development consultant contracted by the IHRC, speaking with the Haiti Support Group, said, “Look, you have to realize the IHRC was not intended to work as a structure or entity for Haiti or Haitians. It was simply designed as a vehicle for donors to funnel multinationals’ and NGOs’ project contracts.”[iii]
McKinsey and Company, a US management consulting firm, was one of the firms that came in to help "design" and "launch" the IHRC.[iv] A background interview with an official very close to the process showed the Haitian government at the beck and call of McKinsey as it structured the commission and determined membership and decision-making processes. (All these aspects later received vehement criticism from Haitian civil society.) At the very first meeting, according to official minutes, it was McKinsey’s lead consultants who “made a presentation to the Board regarding the mission, mandate, structure, and operations of the IHRC.”[v] The consultants sat in on subsequent meetings as well.[vi]
McKinsey & Co. performed its services pro bono. Whether paid or not, the post was a lucrative one; it well-positioned the firm both to influence future contracts and to shape a climate favorable to business. A 2010 World Economic Forum document explicitly stated that “McKinsey helps coordinate with partners to channel interest from the private sector and connect would-be donors and investors to opportunities in Haiti.”[vii]
McKinsey was a natural choice for the job because of its former managing director’s long-time personal and political ties to Bill Clinton, who serves as UN Special Envoy to Haiti and was co-chair of the IHRC board. The firm was also a prime candidate because it advances the paradigm of ‘government as business,’ serving many governments around the world.[viii] As one example, McKinsey played a key role in developing the framework for the reconstruction commissions in Indonesia and Sri Lanka after the Indian Ocean tsunami which, as with the IHRC, involved infusing foreign private sector individuals into policy-making. This was another case in which the local population was excluded from having a say in its own future following another disaster; civil society groups denounced the Rehabilitation and Reconstruction Agency (BRR in Bahasa) for being extremely centralized and discounting civil society voices.[ix]
McKinsey came under fire again after Hurricane Katrina and the flood of New Orleans for work it had done prior to the storm. McKinsey helped major insurance companies develop tactics that stalled court proceedings and delayed payments that, in practice, allowed them to avoid paying out claims to their clients who suffered in natural disasters or accidents. Lawsuits against insurance companies asserted that McKinsey’s pre-Katrina advice, particularly to Allstate, effectively helped insurers cheat their customers.[x]
Another US firm, Korn/Ferry International, came on board to head-hunt the executive director of the IHRC. This was to replace the initial staffing that had been provided by the Clinton Foundation, International Development Bank, and the governments of the US and Canada.[xi] Korn/Ferry circulated a job announcement, in English, through politically connected circles in the US and Haiti, as though it were hiring for any profit-oriented business instead of for a team that was making major decisions in the name of a nation and its well-being. The announcement noted that, “Leadership experience in highly efficient and structured organizations, such as the military, is an advantage.”
Korn/Ferry provides recruitment services for both corporate and government positions, and keeps its finger on the pulse of the increasing overlap of the two. It even published a report encouraging companies to hire leadership with government and policy backgrounds and vice versa, in what it called a "new marriage between business and government.”[xii]
Vesting foreign enterprises with political power is fundamentally anti-democratic. If US firms’ performance in post-earthquake governance is any example, it is a frightening indicator of what might emerge with even greater participation in decision-making, as mandated by the redevelopment blueprint published in March 2010 by the Haitian government and international community.
As ineffectual as the Haitian government may be, its functions can’t be outsourced. Haiti needs a government with responsibility to the citizenry who elected it and the ability to protect their rights. The pursuits of foreign firms – making governance decisions about rebuilding, paving the way for other firms’ Haitian debuts, racking up humanitarian clout – have been at the expense of Haitians still struggling for basic needs and democratic power. The public good requires a public sector which can guarantee health, education, adequate food, water, housing, employment, agriculture, and civil liberties. It requires more than unaccountable foreign agencies and private business that can and do pull out when they like.
Deepa Panchang is the Education and Outreach Coordinator for Other Worlds. She has worked in advocacy for human rights in Haiti since the 2010 earthquake.
Beverly Bell has worked with Haitian social movements for over 30 years. She is also author of the book Walking on Fire: Haitian Women's Stories of Survival and Resistance and is working on the forthcoming book, Fault Lines: Views across Haiti’s New Divide. She coordinates Other Worlds, which promotes social and economic alternatives. She is also associate fellow of the Institute for Policy Studies. You can access all of Other Worlds’ past articles regarding post-earthquake Haiti here.
Copyleft Other Worlds. You may reprint this article in whole or in part. Please credit any text or original research you use to Deepa Panchang and Beverly Bell, Other Worlds.
BOUCAN CARRE, Haiti — Sometimes it seems as though the people here have only the sun and moon: the blinding sun that bakes their mud homes and moonlight that with flickering gas lamps fights against the dark of night.
In this Feb. 14, 2012 photo, Dr. Valentin Abe, director of Caribbean Harvest, feeds fish in a tank where solar panels are reflected in the water near the Saint-Michel health center in Boucan Carre, Haiti. This lakeside village is getting its first hint of industry: a fish hatchery with pumps powered by solar power. The solar panels will also provide the town with a dependable electricity supply for the first time. The solar project is part of a broader effort to harness some of the $4.5 billion pledged to Haiti since the January 2010 earthquake to address one of the main bottlenecks in the country's development: a critical lack of electricity. Only a quarter of Haiti's 10 million people has regular access to electricity. (AP Photo/Dieu Nalio Chery)
In this Feb. 15, 2012 photo, a woman prepares food by candlelight in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Only a quarter of Haitians have regular access to electricity and spotty supply hampers businesses and scares away foreign investors. The scarcity touches just about every aspect of Haitian life, as students read by candlelight and the wealthy power their homes with generators. (AP Photo/Dieu Nalio Chery)
In this Feb. 15, 2012 photo, people make their way through a dark street in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Only a quarter of Haitians have regular access to electricity and spotty supply hampers businesses and scares away foreign investors. The scarcity touches just about every aspect of Haitian life, as students read by candlelight and the wealthy power their homes with generators. (AP Photo/Dieu Nalio Chery)
Electricity arrived just three months ago in this mountain village, and it's gone as often as it's on. With no power, there is no industry, just tiny farms and grinding hunger. Now that will be changing, with the help of that sun.
A Haitian aid agency has just installed 63 solar panels that will power the pumps of a fish hatchery it hopes will give jobs to 100 people after it formally opens next month.
Boucan Carre is among dozens of projects across Haiti where the government and development agencies are using some of the $4.5 billion in earthquake aid to solve one of the bottlenecks that kept Haiti in poverty long before the shattering earthquake of January 2010: a critical lack of electricity of any sort, whether from hydro plants, solar cells or oil-fired generators.
Only a quarter of Haiti's 10 million people have regular access to electricity and spotty supply hampers businesses and scares away foreign investors. The scarcity touches just about every aspect of Haitian life. Students read by candlelight. Haiti's wealthy power their homes with rumbling generators, a costly ordeal because fuel fetches $5 a gallon in a country where 80 percent of the population makes less than $2 a day.
President Michel Martelly's administration hopes to double the number of rural homes with access to power by helping villagers acquire solar-power systems, reforming the state power company and refurbishing the country's largest energy generator. In all, some $260 million has been earmarked for energy projects so far.
"If we properly tackle the energy problem we will infuse a dynamic into the whole development process of Haiti," said Rene Jean-Jumeau, who oversees the government's energy department. The absence of electricity is "the biggest thing that's impeding development."
Boucan Carre's 6,000 people live along a river named Fonlanfe — roughly "deep as hell" — that surges in the rainy season and that aid workers are using to supply the fish farm, which will need a steady supply of power.
"It has to be reliable because you need electricity 24 hours a day," said Valentin Abe of the Caribbean Harvest Foundation, the Haitian nonprofit that is donating the fish. The Washington-based Solar Electric Light Fund received a $500,000 grant from the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund for the hatchery.
The solar panels and batteries power pumps that pull water from a river and add oxygen to six, 12,000-gallon tanks filled with baby fish. The extra oxygen raises the yield of fish from 2,000 a month to 20,000.
The fish are then given to the farmers who raise them at a nearby lake. Valentin hopes that people who now live on less than a dollar a day working at small farm plots will have annual profits of $2,000 each, in addition to a source of protein-rich meals.
Elsewhere, the government working with banks to award more than $30 million in low-interest loans so that 200,000 families can buy portable solar-power kits.
The biggest target is Haiti's decrepit electric company, which eats up $100 million a year in official subsidies, 12 percent of the government's budget.
It hasn't been able to crack down on Haitians who just steal power by tapping illegally into the grid, and cannot provide steady power to any of its customers, even in the capital.
In Port-au-Prince, a team of carpenters build bed frames, doors and coffins, all by hand, in the shade of a tarp strung among tree trunks. One of them, 55-year-old Francis Pierre, longs to use his power tools but says there is seldom electricity.
"We would be able to make more, produce more," he said.
Haitian officials turned to the U.S. Agency for International Development, which awarded a contract to a private utility operator, Tetra Tech Inc. of Pasadena, California, to manage the electric company for two years. USAID is also repairing five substations in the capital, Port-au-Prince, and is studying the possibility of using solar panels for an industrial park in the north.
One of the biggest projects is the Inter-American Development Bank's $48.8-million plan to refurbish Haiti's Peligre hydroelectric plant, the country's largest energy producer. It now operates at less than half its original capacity of 54 megawatts because its reservoir hasn't been properly maintained.
The cell phone company Digicel, Haiti's largest employer, has built about 180 solar-powered lamps in the countryside and hopes to add 1,000 more by next year. Each light features an outlet for charging mobile phones.
Boston-based Partners in Health has installed solar panels in the hospitals it runs with the Health Ministry, and plans to build more with the Solar Electric Light Fund.
"If we would go three hours without electricity and the refrigerator doesn't work, there's a risk we'll lose our supply of medication," said Raymond Abraham, a 30-year-old pharmacist in training at the Boucan Carre hospital, which is powered with solar panels on the roof. "The best solution to resolve the blackout situation is solar energy."
In Port-au-Prince, solar lamps illuminate a winding thoroughfare that takes motorists to the mountains above the capital as well as the settlement camps that sprung up after the earthquake.
But solar energy panels are expensive and the equipment is not always easy to repair. Replacement parts often are not available in Haiti.
Energy development "needs to be locally controlled and not a dumping of technology from abroad," said Joel Kupferman, executive director of the Environmental Justice Initiative for Haiti.
