Our goal is to foster sustainable development initiatives for Haiti, through dialog, planning, and socially responsible investment funding. For more information about us, see Who We Are. We are actively looking for projects and investment opportunities. Please reach out to us if you are looking to collaborate or can provide resources to assist in this effort.
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Important Updates:
- Please note that this domain, ASustainableHaiti.org, will be discontinued (though an archive will be maintained at http://ashaiti.vrcn.com for the time being). We’ve set up a new site at SustainableHaitiCoalition.org, since launching the Coalition at the Sustainable Haiti Conference in Miami (March 17-19, 2010). We were involved in planning a portion of last year’s Conference on April 2-4, 2011, also in Miami; and led a session at this year’s, which took place April 23-25, 2012. Please visit us at SustainableHaitiCoalition.org for updates.
- Ton Vriens‘ new article on “The Aid Business in Haiti,” originally published in the Dutch magazine De Groene Amsterdammer, March 30, 2010 issue, appears here in translation for the first time.
- We’re also seeking to move our 4-part proposal through the official aid management community, so that we can play a role in influencing policy, focusing reconstruction efforts on sustainable development, and working with NGOs, communities, and universities on the ground.
- We’ve just developed our first “appropriate technology,” a hand-operated oil press. Ton will be evaluating this in the field, to see if it makes sense to create a coop to press oil from local seeds, or to seek to create a low-cost model that could be used in the home.
- Life360.com has published a remarkable “infographic” of the global aid effort in Haiti, embedded on our Frontlines page.
 There’s no doubt that many new sites have sprung up in the wake of Haiti’s devastating earthquake (see the Links in the right-hand column for some examples of newer ones), and this one does not pretend to be comprehensive. Our goal is rather to provide a vehicle for groups and individuals interested in the long-term sustainable reconstruction of Haiti to dialog, list needs and opportunities, and keep in touch with the ongoing efforts of the Working Group for a Sustainable Future for Haiti that was convened at Fairleigh Dickinson University on February 5, 2010.
Continue reading About this Site
The Aid Business in Haiti
By Ton Vriens
(Translation of an article about Haiti for the Dutch magazine De Groene Amsterdammer, issue March 30, 2010)
Two months of international aid has turned Port-au-Prince into occupied territory. Military helicopters thumping overhead with gunners in the door opening – Apocalypse Now – navy vessels anchored in the bay. An American force of 22,000 troops, now being reduced to 11,000 in addition to a UN-army of 11,000, is mobilized to secure the aid operation. A ba okipasyon! – down with the occupation! – reads the graffiti all over town.
Continue reading The Aid Business in Haiti – a dispatch from Ton Vriens
Doug Hess has posted an early version of the official Post-Disaster Needs Assessment (PDNA) [March 20]:
I am not sure if this is the official translation, so caveat lector, but here’s a PDF (500k) version in English of the Government of Haiti’s plan. Please also note that the introduction refers to this as a draft plan, so additional versions may be coming (presumably after additional meetings with the international community).
Hess’s site looks like one of the best that is keeping track of the latest official and unofficial developments affecting Haiti’s future. He describe it as “A place to gather people, resources, and informed discussion about public management, policy analysis, evaluation, and related research regarding Haiti’s future as a democratic and healthy nation.” Add the word “sustainable,” and this could describe our site as well.
Continue reading Government of Haiti Action Plan for Reconstruction and Development (PDNA)
See a brief video of Dr. Robert Gordon discussing his recent visit to Haiti following the earthquake on January 12th at http://haitionward.org/2010/03/25/healing-the-mind-in-haiti/.
In this photo montage/sound bite—developed by Haiti Onward for use before a keynote at the Haiti Conference—Dr. Gordon describes how the epic challenge of getting the people of Haiti to help themselves is one that will affect everyone in the country for many years to come. He also added that the resilience of Haiti’s culture has shown remarkable strength in the days and weeks following the earthquake.
The Sustainable Haiti conference just concluded in Miami (March 17-19, 2010) was remarkable in a number of ways, not least of which were the areas where the perspective of sustainability was noticeably missing. (“Sustainability” has now clearly become a buzzword that just about everyone wants to lay claim to, whether they understand it or not.)
In many of the informal discussions it was of course noticeably present, so this set up a very fruitful dialog with the proponents of the more traditional approaches to economic development —who were themselves seeking to break with the failed history of “dead aid,” to use the term coined by Dambisa Moyo, who was one of the first to speak at the event.
Continue reading Sustainable Haiti Conference
March 19th, The New York Times Deborah Sontag reports on Haiti’s mental health system after the earthquake.
The foreign psychiatrists emphasize that they have found Haitians to be impressively resilient, but the disaster has nonetheless set off reactions ranging from anxiety through psychosis. Most worrisome are cases like that of Guerda Joseph, a 41-year-old woman who tumbled into a catatonic depression shortly after she was pulled from the rubble of her home. Mute and nearly immobilized ever since, she lies on floral sheets at the General Hospital, her Bible tucked beside her pillow, her 25-year-old adopted son by her side day and night.
Continue reading “In Haiti, Mental Health System is in Collapse”
Several distinct permaculture-oriented groups have mounted or are planning to mount permaculture-oriented relief and reconstruction efforts in Haiti.
Continue reading Permaculture and the Permacorps Relief Effort in Haiti
 The S.E.VEN Fund – Ending Global Poverty through Enterprise-Based Solutions
http://www.sevenfund.org/about.php
SEVEN (Social Equity Venture Fund) is a virtual non-profit entity run by entrepreneurs whose strategy is to markedly increase the rate of innovation and diffusion of enterprise-based solutions to poverty. It does this by targeted investment that fosters thought leadership through books, films and websites; supporting role models – whether they are entrepreneurs or innovative firms – in developing nations; and shaping a new discourse in government, the press and the academy around private-sector innovation, prosperity and progressive human values.
Pioneers of Prosperity — Caribbean Region
http://pioneersofprosperity.org/content/view/39/103/lang,english/
| The Pioneers of Prosperity Awards Programs is being presented in partnership with the Multilateral Investment Fund (MIF) at the Inter-American Development Bank. The MIF promotes inclusive growth through private sector development. Learn more about the IADB:http://www.iadb.org |
In Switch: How to Make Change when Change is Hard (2010), Chip and Dan Heath argue that “cloning success” is a much better approach than trying to solve big, intractable problems. “We need to ask ourselves a question that sounds simple but is, in fact, deeply unnatural: What’s working and how can we do more of it?” In our “Amplifying Success” section, we argue for applying this approach in Haiti, and invite groups and individuals to provide examples that can be shared with others.
Continue reading Amplifying Small Successes
By all means post your “position wanted in Haiti” information here in the Comments Section; but please visit http://sustainablehaiticoalition.org/?page_id=707 and cross-post your entry there. You can also join our Forum and discuss job opportunities in Haiti directly with other Coalition members.
This site is no longer actively maintained. For our latest postings of job opportunities in Haiti, see the Jobs page at http://sustainablehaiticoalition.org/ (last update 8/19/12).
Voila is hiring: http://www.wearehaiti.com/
Search UN Wire job opportunities here:
https://jobs.smartbrief.com/action/search?searchtype=all&listing.title=haiti
Continue reading Current Job Opportunities in Haiti
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There’s no doubt that many new sites have sprung up in the wake of Haiti’s devastating earthquake (see the Links in the right-hand column for some examples of newer ones), and this one does not pretend to be comprehensive. Our goal is rather to provide a vehicle for groups and individuals interested in the long-term sustainable reconstruction of Haiti to dialog, list needs and opportunities, and keep in touch with the ongoing efforts of the Working Group for a Sustainable Future for Haiti that was convened at Fairleigh Dickinson University on February 5, 2010.
Sustainable Haiti Conference
The Sustainable Haiti conference just concluded in Miami (March 17-19, 2010) was remarkable in a number of ways, not least of which were the areas where the perspective of sustainability was noticeably missing. (“Sustainability” has now clearly become a buzzword that just about everyone wants to lay claim to, whether they understand it or not.)
In many of the informal discussions it was of course noticeably present, so this set up a very fruitful dialog with the proponents of the more traditional approaches to economic development —who were themselves seeking to break with the failed history of “dead aid,” to use the term coined by Dambisa Moyo, who was one of the first to speak at the event.
Continue reading Sustainable Haiti Conference