Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, and for most Haitians, daily life is a struggle for survival. An estimated 65 percent of the population lives in poverty; in rural areas that number is about 80 percent. These people, many of whom farm small plots of poor mountain land, are often malnourished. Infant mortality is 76 per 1,000 births, life expectancy at birth is only 52 years, and the incidence of diseases ranging from intestinal parasites to AIDS is extremely high. Only about 46 percent of the population has access to safe drinking water, and only 28 percent has access to sanitary sewer systems.
A limited elite of about 10 percent, mostly professionals, enjoys a sophisticated, affluent lifestyle. This elite class has traditionally resisted all attempts to restructure the Haitian social system.

Agrandir le plan

Verrettes is a commune – similar to a county in the US – in Artibonite Region, which forms the lower half of the northern peninsula of the country. Thanks to the Artibonite River, which flows past Verrettes, those in the plain are able to cultivate three harvests each year: beans, followed by corn, followed by rice. Ancestral plots of land belonging to individual families tend to be small; many people lease plots from larger landholders, to whom they must also return a portion of their harvest.

The mountains surrounding the river valley, which make up the major part of the commune of Verrettes, are deforested, and have lost most of their topsoil. There are few roads in the mountains, and those which exist are in poor condition. A number of agronomists, both Haitian and foreign, have begun working with the peasants in the mountains, forming groups and teaching them methods of soil conservation, water conservation, reforestation...

The Albert Schweitzer hospital in DesChapelles has an excellent development program which gives training to the leaders of these groups in the above areas as well as in veterinary medicine, human rights, hygiene, etc. It also has established clinics in various localities where people can go for first treatment, and which refer them to the hospital in cases they are not equipped to care for. But the fact remains that hunger and the illnesses which follow on extreme poverty are endemic. Many, many children are malnourished, as can be seen in their stunted physical, and sometimes mental, development.

In Verrettes, as in the rest of Haiti, there are many restaveks. These are children, sometimes as young as three or four years old, whose parents have died, or whose families cannot afford to care for them. They have been given to another family to stay with. Some are relatively well-treated, but all of them must perform the most menial tasks, starting very early in the morning. They carry buckets of water to the house, empty chamber pots, clean the house, yard, and the street in front of the house. They learn early to wash laundry in the canal, and cook meals. They themselves usually eat the left-overs, if there are any. Their clothes are dirty and torn, and often their little bodies are covered with dust and dirt and tropical sores. Some of them are allowed to go to school; many are not.