COUNTRY
PROFILE
(The following profile
relates to pre- the earthquake of January 12, 2010)
Haiti shares the Caribbean island of
Hispaniola with the Dominican Republic.
It has a population of some 10 million people most of whom
were surviving on less than US$2 per day. The country has
a history of violence, instability and dictatorship, though
democratic rule was restored in 2006 and UN peacekeepers have
been deployed there since 1994.
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Before the earthquake, the infrastructure
in Haiti was already in a sorry state, and drug trafficking had
corrupted the police and the judicial system. Massive deforestation
had left just 2 per cent of forested area, making the country prone
to flooding. The economy was in ruins, unemployment chronic, and
foreign aid considered vital. Haiti was plagued by violent confrontations
between rival gangs and political groups, with the UN describing
the human rights situation as “catastrophic”.
Haiti’s most serious underlying, and
largely unaddressed, social problem has been the huge wealth gap
between the impoverished Creole-speaking black majority and the
French-speaking minority, one per cent of who own nearly half the
country's wealth.
Gross national income (GNI) per capita stood
at US$542; life expectancy at birth was 63 years for women and 59
years for men, and infant mortality 49 per 1,000 live births.
Haiti was ranked 148th of 182 countries on the UN 2009 Human Development
Index.
HISTORY OF GOAL IN HAITI:
On January 12, 2010, a massive 7-0 magnitude
earthquake struck just a few miles south of the Haitian capital
of Port-au-Prince. This was followed quickly by two strong aftershocks
with magnitudes of 5.9 and 5.5.
A GOAL representative entered Haiti
some 26 hours after the earthquake. Within a short time he was joined
in Port-au-Prince by GOAL’s emergency response team.
GOAL is a major partner of US Aid and
the UN World Food Programme (WFP) in Haiti, with 32 GOALies on the
ground, bringing emergency relief to the survivors that includes
medical support and distributions of food and non-food items.
Port-au-Prince was almost completely
flattened, with some estimates of loss of life in the region of
270,000 people. About 300,000 people were injured and some 1.5 million
left homeless.
Water and sanitation, electricity and phone connections were destroyed.
Houses, hospitals, health centres, schools, the local UN headquarters
building and even a large prison were all brought down.
The airport and seaport were rendered inoperable.
With so many people left homeless,
hundreds of spontaneous settlements have sprung up around Port-au-Prince.
The city now largely consists of a mass of tented villages, the
vast majority of which are without sanitation facilities or access
to clean water.
Currently, the GOALies distribute food
and non-food items in the Turgeau and Petionville districts of Port-au-Prince,
to the benefit of some 250,000 people.
Food is allocated the mornings, and non-food items, such as kitchen
kits, blankets, plastic sheeting, sanitation kits and mosquito nets,
in the evenings.
A GOALie health team of doctors and
nurses works in a field hospital in the Dalmas district, which is
estimated to have the highest concentration of homeless people in
the city.
In the conditions that exist in the
camps, when the rainy season comes in late April or early May there
will doubtless be the added problem of diseases such as cholera
to contend with.
CURRENT GOAL PROGRAMMES IN HAITI:
• Emergency Medical Support
• Distribution of Food items
• Distribution of Non-Food Items
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