Campaign 2008

Campaign text 2008 – Haïti also has talent

To hell and back

‘Compared to the capital, Port-au-Prince, Cape Rouge is paradise’, those are the words of the farmer Joachim Sanon. ‘There is no noise and there is food, for those who are willing to work. I am never going back, I am not crazy.’

Together with his wife, André-Rose Lycée, Joachim lives on a small farm in the hills of Cape Rouge, a borough of Kay Jacmel, near the Haitian South Coast. They have four children. Jodel Archange (10), Rose Hermith (6) and Frantz Cadet (3) who all live at home. Méliza (7) lives with her godmother. André-Rose is a teacher at the primary school of Cape Rouge. The classes take place in the morning. In the afternoon, she works on the farm. The family is a member of VEDEK, a farmers’ organisation specialised in training for farm techniques, which also takes initiatives to improve the quality of life for the families. Joachim is the treasurer of VEDEK.

When he was a young fellow, he had completely different plans. He left for Port-au-Prince in 1981 in order to study electronics in the capital. He was determined never to return to the countryside again.  With a diploma, he was sure he could build a good life for himself in the city. ‘The first confrontation with the capital was a real shock to me’, says Joachim. ‘I stayed with acquaintances of my mother. We were sixteen in that house, and we were hungry every day. Sometimes I went back to my house in the country to get some food, so that we could get by a few days again.’ I never even once thought of giving up. ‘You just brace yourself. You want to prove you can survive in the city. I moved to the house of a friend and there things were a little better. I studied and worked at the same time. After I earned my diploma in 1985, I found a job at a factory that produced electronic components, a poorly paid job.’

Around this time, I moved again, this time to Cité Soleil, the big slums of Port-au-Prince. The six years that Joachim spent there are full of bad memories. ‘Only animals can live there: mosquitoes and rats. You are packed in like sardines, it smells horrible, the water is polluted, and there is a lot of destitution and a striking lack of hygiene. But again I chose not to give up. I wanted to succeed. I didn’t want to be unemployed, I even accepted night work. It was a degrading life.’

The coup d’état against President Aristide, on 30 September 1991, was the last blow. The factory closed. ‘For my own life, this coup actually was a liberation’, says Joachim. ‘I turned my back on the city. After eleven years I decided to go back to Cape Rouge, to my parents, and to start over again there.’


Farmer in Cape Rouge

‘My parents were glad to see me, but at first they didn’t realise I was back for good’, says Joachim with a smile. ’Even when I bought pigs, they thought I was buying food to take with me to the city, and they didn’t think I would breed them. The first year, I worked on their farm. Afterwards, they gave me a piece of land, so that I could start up my own farm. In 1992, I began growing bananas. I bought 250 rootstocks. The people here thought I was crazy because I ran around with a bin full of animals’ excrements to fertilise my banana plants. But when they saw the results they began using organic manure themselves.’

This way Joachim became a pioneer for the introduction of new cultivation techniques which most farmers in the neighbourhood are now using. André-Rose and Joachim show us how and why they keep their pigs on a string in the banana plantation. Every day they move the animals to another banana plant, so that the manure is at once deposited at the right place. In their garden they grow yam, beans, vegetables and fruit. ‘And so you see, life here in Cape Rouge is not so bad’, remarks Joachim. ‘We have a house to live in and we have abundant and varied food. We’ve got a family. We were given responsibility and we have taken advantage of that responsibility.’


Sowing a Future

This responsibility which Joachim mentions is of course linked to VEDEK (Vive Espoir pour le Développement de Cap Rouge), the umbrella organisation of farmers’ groups in the area. VEDEK was founded in 1988. Presently, VEDEK unites some twenty farmers’ groups in ten villages. Every farmers’ group consists of twenty to forty families.

Once upon a time, this area was known for its cultivation of coffee. But when the international coffee market collapsed, the farmers were condemned to bitter poverty. For VEDEK it was therefore a top priority for the farmers to start cultivating food crops again. An adequate training helped to increase and improve the harvest of rice, cassava, sorghum, vegetables, sugar and stock breeding. The farmers built silos to store food. This allows them to eat the food from their own harvests all year long.  

Water was a second important problem. By building large, closed, cemented water tanks for the collection of rainwater, there is water for the vegetable garden, the cattle and the washing room. This is a vast improvement, because collecting water from the source is a heavy and time-consuming task.

The deforestation in the past has led to erosion in the hills of Cape Rouge and this is a serious problem. The soil is no longer detained by an interweaving of tree, bush and herb roots. This way the slopes lose their fertile upper layer and all that is left are bare rocks. Much attention is spent on reforestation and agricultural techniques that help to protect the slopes, such as constructing terraces and contour vegetation planting. ‘But it is at least equally important to plant several different agricultural crops mixed together so that the soil is permanently covered by overgrowth and held together by roots,’ says Joachim. ‘Goats are also major culprits. They eat the young trees’ leaves and break loose the soil with their hoofs. It is therefore important to tie them up and not to let them run wild.’ Joachim shows us his own method: he keeps his goats inside a fence and cultivates their feed on a separate field.’ That way the slope is permanently covered and erosion is stopped.’


Women create a rural economy

Since recently VEDEK stimulates the sale of agricultural products processed by the farmers themselves. This has allowed women in particular to gain an extra income for their family. In Cape Rouge they make liqueur, jam and peanut butter. They also have their own bakery. Such initiatives provide people with money for school, health care and domestic products.

If women can make finished goods and are able to sell them directly to the consumer, they are able to create employment outside of agriculture. If this employment has growth potential, this inspires hope for a future in the rural area. André-Rose and Joachim also harbour this dream for their children. Joachim wants to spare them the experiences he himself had in Port-au-Prince. ‘I want them to be able to study, but only to enable them to return here and work in Cape Rouge and to dedicate themselves to the development of the community’, he says.


Young people’s choice for the rural area

This is not self-evident. Young people who went to cities like Jacmel or Port-au-Prince to study dream of a life that does not only consist of working, eating and sleeping. The rural areas must therefore also offer young people enough possibilities to develop. This is why VEDEK founded the Commission Jeune, a youth movement. The Commisssion has a modest library and a booth that acts as a conference room and meeting place. The Commission Jeune is a mixed movement and is directed by Lena Jean-Baptiste, a dynamic young woman. This is important, for in this way it breaks the traditionally inferior position of women in Haitian society.
The youth movement is evenly matched with the other commissions of VEDEK, each of which manage a certain part of the organisation. This allows young people to participate fully in new initiatives. They believe that gradually a rural economy will grow which offers more perspective than a life in the city slums.


Haiti’s miracle

‘It is a paradox that in our country there is a central government that has never assumed its responsibility, while at the basis of the country farmers have always organised themselves to work together for a better life. In my opinion, the rural population has performed a miracle: they have kept on working during all these turbulent years, they have kept on producing, kept on fighting for the preservation of small-scale farming and of their own culture. VEDEK in Cape Rouge is an admirable example.’ That is the opinion of Camille Chalmers, socio-economist, professor at the state university of Haiti and especially coordinator of PAPDA (Plate-Forme Haïtienne de Plaidoyer pour un Développement Alternatif), a partner organisation of Broederlijk Delen. PAPDA is a coalition of social organisations and movements working on development.

PAPDA supports VEDEK as a pilot project. It organises training and support for their initiative. Women can turn to PAPDA if they want to start breeding goats. They then receive a goat by way of a loan. They pay PAPDA back later with young goats, which can in turn be given as a loan to other families. In the same way, women can also receive lay hens or cocks to start up a lay hen production or an egg farm.

People’s own plans

To give groups of people the chance to realise their own plans to fight poverty and injustice…According to Camille Chalmers, Broederlijk Delen’s typical approach matches perfectly the working methods of PAPDA: ‘The real leading actors are the grass roots groups: women’s groups, unions, local communities. They are the ones inventing new formulas for development. If you are prepared to really take into account the people’s own plans, sustainable development can be realised’.

Food sovereignty
    
A central issue in PAPDA’s work is the programme concerning food sovereignty: the countries’ right to determine their own agriculture policy and to protect their food production so that farmers can feed their own population and are not obliged to live off of imported goods. This is a very topical issue in Haiti. Since 1996 it has fallen victim to an insolent liberalisation. In order to receive debt relief from abroad, Haiti was forced by the IMF (International Monetary Fund) and by the World Bank to open up its market. The import duties for strategic food crops such as maize and rice decreased from 50% to 3% and for other agricultural products to 0%. Cheap food surpluses from the world market – mainly the US – massively enter the country.

‘The consequences are disastrous’, says Camille Chalmers. ‘In the four most important agricultural sectors in Haiti, namely the production of sugar, rice, chickens and eggs, we have lost 830,000 jobs over the last eight years. That means that a hundred thousand people lose their means of existence every year. Today there are still some 90,000 people active in the cultivation of rice. If there are no changes in policy, they are sure to be driven out of the market as well.

Meanwhile the capital Port-au-Prince has been spreading unchecked. The slums around the city are spreading out into the neighbouring cities of Delmas, Carrefour and Fond-Parisien. The Port-au-Prince metropolitan area counts between 2.5 and 3 million inhabitants, a third of the country’s whole population. ‘People are talking about the ‘republic of Port-au-Prince’ because the policy of successive governments only concentrated on the capital and neglected the rural areas’, says Camille. ‘The slums are a consequence of this misgovernment.’


Cassava vs wheat

The inhabitants of Cape Rouge nowadays also suffer the competition of imported food. Cassava is a traditional crop that grows well in hilly areas. But the consumption of cassava has decreased. Bread, baked with cheaply imported wheat from the US has dethroned cassava.
Still people are determined to reconquer a piece of the domestic food market. Not by growing wheat, because it doesn’t grow well in tropical areas, but by growing cassava. From this point of view, 2007 was an important year for VEDEK. In April, the farmers had a solemn inauguration of their own ‘cassaverie’, a building with a cassava mill, a working place and a shop. Next to the building, they constructed a big water tank to collect rainwater and to wash the dirt from the cassava roots. The cassaverie buys cassava roots from the farmers and converts it to tapioca (cassava). In the cassaverie the tapioca is wrapped up in small bags and labelled and afterwards sold.

The advantages of this undertaking are clear. The wrapped up tapioca is much handier to transport along bad roads. But above all, the farmers hope that their tapioca will reach the bakeries and is used to bake the now popular bread. This bread can also be made by mixing the tapioca and the imported wheat flour. If part of the wheat is replaced by a local product, this may at last make a significant difference for the farmers’ income.

Approximately one hundred farmers are now linked up to the cassaverie. By means of a loan for starting an enterprise, they are able to buy young plants. When harvesting they can pay back the loan in kind. The cassaverie also buys the cassava of the farmers who are not members. This way, the farmers are encouraged to plant more cassava. At the end of the year, the cassaverie keeps part of the profits to make new investments and use as working capital. The rest of the profits are paid out to the members.

If the cassaverie works properly, the farmers also intend to sell other agricultural products there: aubergines, cabbages, beans, peppers, etc. But this is only a beginning. The real challenge is to increase the production and to expand the market to the neighbouring town of Jacmel, and later also to Port-au-Prince.

The bad roads are today a true obstacle. Moreover, the distributive trade is in the hands of wholesale buyers who cash in half of the profits. Together with the other farmers of VEDEK, Joachim and André-Rose dream of the day when the inhabitants of Cape Rouge can face the bad roads themselves by means of rented trucks and can sell their harvest in the city: ‘If you have means of transport, you can sell your harvest together, but you can also purchase goods together. And that is much more advantageous.’


The farmers’ initiative

What the farmers are realizing in Cap Rouge is to Camille Chalmers a perfect example of what PAPDA means by ‘making the farmers the leading characters of rural development’. ‘These farmers are now at an important moment of their own area’s development,’ says the coordinator of PAPDA, ‘namely at the transition from a subsistence agriculture to an agriculture concentrated on processing and sale at the domestic market. In order to succeed they need to organise themselves, attend trainings, increase their production, pay attention to quality improvement and control the entire commercial circuit up to the end consumer. This is the new logic the farmers need to adopt.’
‘The farmers’ organisations have to do this themselves. The government unfortunately doesn’t promote an agricultural policy which stimulates agricultural production. But this should change as well. Part of our work is exactly making sure that the grassroots understand what is being discussed in national politics and that they can make their voice heard and express their opinions and that the politicians respect their choices.’


To strengthen the voice of the farmers

Together with all its member organisations, PAPDA keeps pressure on the politicians. The organisation supports and reinforces the grassroots’ organisations in their negotiations with governments on a local and national level. It keeps a close eye on the discussions of international commercial treaties. They are lobbying in international networks and taking part in meetings such as the WSF (World Social Forum). Through PAPDA, the farmers also have a voice in Broederlijk Delen’s lobbying work and in networks such as the ‘Coordination Europe-Haiti’, the Haitian NGOs’ advocate at the European Union.
‘While waiting for a better government policy, the farmers until then try to realise some attainable goals themselves,’ says Camille Chalmers. ‘We are convinced that there is a future for Haiti. There are many barriers to overcome, but luckily we are blessed with a lot of creativity in the Haitian rural population and with the unique culture of cooperation. We are continuing to work, we have hope.’


‘Van karèm’ : time and again hope survives
 
In springtime, a dry and hard wind blows through Haiti. The ‘Van karèm’, the ‘wind of Lent’, is ideal for children to fly their self-made kites. Until Easter, you can see them everywhere, both in the city and in the countryside. For the Haitians these kites have no extra meaning. But to the European visitors, who see that people have the courage to get to work every day again in this weary country, these kites are colourful signals that hope for rebirth out of suffering and slavery is not yet dead.

‘The joy of living and hope for improvement are ingrained in the Haitian culture,’ says William Smarth, theologian and priest in the city Les Cayes. ‘In Haiti we can find the theme of life everywhere in folklore and culture. The Haitians love life. But he encounters many obstacles. It is our job to get rid of those obstacles and to work for God’s Kingdom, for a future of peace and justice. Over the past few years we have grown to understand that progress is not only a case of development, but also of liberation out of structures of oppression. The Haitian people are capable of building something new from the wreckage of the past.’


The story continues
    
The image of the kites remains in our minds. It tells us about the beckoning freedom, about the self-chosen future, about the self-made plans of groups of people in their fight against poverty and injustice. It challenges us to let a ‘van karèm’ blow in Flanders and to fly a kite of a future of solidarity and partnership. It is not a dream, but a future that is realised every day more and more by André-Rose, Joachim, VEDEK and many other farmers’ groups. We are proud to call these people our ‘partners’. This means that thanks to our support to their own plans, we have a place in their story. We invite everybody to become a part of the continuation of this story.