Economic Growth Haiti Project #4571

Contribute to Long-Term Rebuilding in Haiti

by Lambi Fund of Haiti

Project Report | Dec 2, 2015
Progress in whose terms?

By Marie Marthe Saint Cyr | Executive Director

Asking for justice for rural Haiti

We are making progress as we undergird our economic development projects with advocacy and voicing the need for equity, parity and justice. Rebuilding Haiti is not only focusing on re-establishing, schools for education, housing post eartquake, nor is it provision of water and basic necessities for health, welfare. It is also looking at strategies that will impact life conditions with systemic changes.

If we have in concert made a valid choice this year, it is to redouble our efforts for civic education and expand our work on empowerment and advocacy through networking and seeking justice for all people in haiti. Indeed this is the foundational that is needed for rebuilding in Haiti an institution of justice to uphold the rights of all its people to be treated with dignity and respect.

Climate change is already a deadly reality in Haiti. Grassroots groups in Haiti are reporting a 7-month drought. Two seasons’ crops have been lost in many parts of the country. While droughts have been a fact of life in the past, researchers have noted a steady decrease in rainfall for each of the past twenty years. And climate change is directly connected to the destructiveness of extreme weather events, like hurricanes. So the good projects that Lambi empowered our partners to complete are all under threat, said Mark Schuller, Chair of the board of Lambi Fund.

For these reasons and others, this year Lambi has committed ourselves to reinvigorate the civic education part of our mission. When celebrating our 20 years last year, local partners asked for our support in creating regional networks. We have begun this process of making these connections, to empower grassroots groups to build common ground and a platform. We have supported the regional networks with increasing Civic Education trainings in the South and Artibonite. Combined with continued local development support, this platform will help Haitian grassroots leaders articulate and build a new Haitian society, changing the dynamic between the government and the world economy.

We are enabled with your support and generosity as you also in your localities become more aware that the world is uniting closer as these global changes ultimately impact everyone on this planet. Thankyou for your trust, your dedication and your awareness. You are making a difference in rural Haiti and we want to acknowledge it. Thank you and have a great holiday Season.

listening and learning

Continue with the struggle for the people

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Sep 8, 2015
INCLUSION. ACCESS. EQUITY. EQUALITY.

By Marie Marthe Saint Cyr | Executive Director

Expanding plantain production

Inclusion, access, equity and equality are for us the most essential elements in the long term rebuilding of Haiti. First to gain independence and falling back in giving freedoom to its people, Haiti is far from creating a free place where people can, by their boot straps, reach individual freedoms. Long term rebuilding is more than open hands to receive resources; it is much more about creative and proven solutions with local involvement and strong engagement.

The development of community credit funds managed by local organizations to build local enterprises for farmers and for women is a crucial piece of the puzzle for long term rebuilding in Haiti. It combats unemployment, it spurs or stimulates the local market enterprising and creates capacity to reinvest in the community. In addition, these businesses meet the basic needs of community dwellers.

Small commerce is the hallmark of revenue-producing activities in a country where high unempployment has remained consistent over the last two decades and the brain drain is such that it is unrivaled. Partnership with local organizations that creates small funds to support the local commerce is a priority. This is a year for producing revenue and rebuilding the economy and the local neighborhoods, while increasing the number of children in school and the number of survivors.

Throughout this year, Lambi Fund has worked with 14 rural farming organizations in expanding 5,882,500 HTG (Haitian Gourdes) of small loans at a 2% degressive interest rate which has been distributed to 2594 rural planters. Loans are for a duration of six months which facilitate the production of the harvest and tilling the land for the new planting season. The loans to women are for expanding their small businesses. Revenue from the loans has increased the fund balance to 7,719,393 HTG. The revenue from the loans also allows the organizations to increase the number of people who are able to receive loans to create their own revenue or expand their local food production.

The contribution that you have made makes the micro loans possible and improves the number of people who create their own revenue through small enterprises.

Thanks to your generosity, many families today are able to keep their children in school and keep food on the table because they have work.

Women providing supplying the local market

sellers in local market

small business with a loan

Manita small fruit stand flourishing

loans allow for planters to till more land

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Jun 9, 2015
Climate Change Response: Compelled or Planned

By Marie Marthe Saint Cyr | Executive Director

Laying a strong foundation

The "Conseil National de Securite Alimentaire" (Council on Food Security) projected an increase in food shortage for the coming months.The Ministry of Education, the Ministry of the Environment and the Ministry of Agriculture are conferring on the changing weather patterns, (longer draught, shorter rainy season). The evidence of climatic events and climatic change are on the horizon in Haiti. Any plans that are concerned with longterm rebuilding must address these profound lifestyle changes that come with climate events. For rural Haitian farmers in remote areas the problem is more than a threat, it is already a stark reality that cannot be avoided.

Currently, the Lambi Fund partnered with Northwest Haiti, namely IPTKSK (Organization of Peasant from Savann Karre) to respond to the drought impacting 7,500 families in the Northwest of Haiti. In a joint effort, we planned to built 30 cisterns to provide 18,000 gallons of water each to support the growing need for water in the neighborhoods of Dityet, Lakoma and Mawotye. With the support of our GlobalGiving supporters, individuals and other foundations, we have constructed 20 of the 30 cisterns. 10 in Dydyet and 10 in Lakoma are completed.

With 10 more to go, we are meeting a challenge incorporated midstream in the rebuilding of Haiti's already complex environmental profile. It is a work in progress that compels rigueur and flexibility to work in partnership with the most vulnerable to make a change and improve preparedness of those whose lives are at greater risk with the changes we are experiencing.

We thank you for your involvement and continued support in focussing some of our activities on matters of rebuilding Haiti - a longterm effort that requires thoughtfullness, community participation and engagement from all concerned.

Share your thinking by emailing us at info@lambifund.org or meeting on our blog page. I look forward to hearing from you!

Time to rehydrate!

No more trips to those mountains in the back!

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