Kore Pwodiksyon Lokal

Kore Pwodiksyon Lokal (Support Local Production) is a small but growing advocacy movement in Haiti that encourages people to buy local products. Check out this commercial produced by some of my friends at KPL - it has been airing frequently on national television for the last several months. (English subtitles included)


2008 has been a particularly difficult year for the stability of Haitian food system. Protests against the high price of food spread across the country mid-April. Hurricane-related rains in September destroyed a significant percentage of this season's harvest - likely the foreshadowing of further price increases in the months to come.

The artificially low cost of imported food (due to the policies of the US and other governments to subsidize their own farmers to overproduce) and environmental destruction have contributed to the decline in local production of staple foods like rice and peanuts. The lack of a strong stable government means there is little to no leadership in the realms of trade policy or development of infrastrcuture that could help counteract these factors. (Another very pertinent issue is that donor funding follows trends. Agriculture projects were very popular among international donors during the 70's and 80's in the wake of the green revolution. In the 80's, 90's donor attention moved on to other initiatives like family planning and building schools and most recently microfinance and HIV/AIDS, leaving development of the agricultural sector in donor-dependent countries underfunded. When I visited USAID Haiti a couple years ago, they told me that they no longer had a single agronomist on their staff).

Per the law of supply and demand, low supply of locally produced food translates into higher prices. A year ago it was US$2 more per tin to buy Diri Peyi (rice grown in Haiti) than Diri Miami (Miami rice - imported). For families living on less than $1 per day, price inevitably wins out over other perferences. Urban families are particularly prone to purchasing imported food because much of what is produced Haiti's rural agricultural provinces is also consumed there as poor infrastructure makes it logistically difficult and financially costly to get locally grown food to urban markets.

Declines in local production are more than just economic losses. Local food systems deeply reflect cultural identity. Local foods simply taste better to many Haitians. One particular variety of Haitian rice grown in the Artibonnite Valley has a very distinct almost ammonia-like smell and strong taste compared to the bland imported white rice. The first time I cooked with it I actually thought that something had gone terribly wrong and I was really apologetic to the hosts of the dinner party about the bad smell of my rice and lentils. Since then I've grown to really like this uniquely fragrant rice.

One of the exciting things to come from the April food riots was a lot of discussion in the Haitian media about the need to support local production for the sake of Haiti's national food security. Everyday Haitians are able to eloquently articulate fundamental issues of global trade policies and their effect on local food prices. There is a renewed appreciation for the importance of local food systems - and more recently what seems to be an awakening among some international donors for the need to reinvest in national production.

Prophetess(n.): one gifted with more than ordinary spiritual and moral insight; especially; an inspired poet.

If I were to list those people I consider prophets of my generation, Kelly Zen-Yie Tsai would be near the top of my list. An incredibly accomplished Chinese/Taiwanese American spoken word artist / author/ choreographer / multi-media producer Kelly just put out her latest video project BLACK, WHITE, WHATEVER on Youtube and Facebook. It's a timely call demanding that the presidential candidates acknowledge that the mosaic of the US population is composed of more than just black and white pieces.

I was privileged to share in some of the early days of Kelly's journey as an artist and an activist. We went to school together starting in 5th grade and became good friends in high school. I was able to get a front row seat at some of her earliest forays into performance poetry - facilitated by our beloved English teacher and forensics coach Mr. Sampson. (I also played the secretary/treasurer role during her tenure as class president). Several years ago I got to see Kelly perform at a theater festival in Chicago and have followed her work online ever since.

While it's truly incredible to see how far she has come so fast - it's not surprising in the least.

Hurricane recovery update

It's raining tonight in Port-au-Prince, but gently compared to several weeks ago when the series of 3 storms (Gustav, Hanna, and Ike) passed through.

Estimates of the destruction from those storms continue to rise. CNN and the AP report a current death toll of nearly 800. Road damage makes it difficult to reach the most affected areas. Last week, I watched US Marine helicopters on aid runs take off and land from the Port-au-Prince airport. We've seen the cost to transport our latest batch of manba (the fortified peanut butter) double. It comes from a factory in the northern city of Cap-Haitien and damaged roads have contributed to longer transport times at higher gas prices.

Flood damages to crops has caused losses of 20-30% of rice production and 10-20% of banana production. Recommendations are for emergency food distribution to continue until the next harvest cycles in March and June 2009. It's doubtful whether those recommendations will followed through on. The current combined aid appeal of US$107 million is less than 20% funded and it is expected that world attention and relief agency efforts will move on sooner than later.

I haven't been outside of relatively unaffected Port-au-Prince since the storms but I've been hearing lots of stories from friends working for organizations involved in the relief effort. People working up north in hardest hit Gonaives talk about the mud that's everywhere - blocking streets and flowing through what is left of homes. Schools are scheduled to reopen tomorrow after a nationwide delay in the start of the new school year. Up north, this requires clearing out not only the mud but also the families taking refugee in the school buildings.

In the South, roads between the captial Port-au-Prince and Les Cayes, Haiti's second largest city, remain seriously damaged. Right now it's impossible to make the trip without crossing part of the road in a boat. Fuel trucks are too heavy to cross on the small boats and so gas must be carried in a barrel at a time. As a result, gas stations are running out of gas. My friend B called me from Les Cayes on Friday night saying he was cooking in the dark since power lines had still not been repaired and gas shortages meant he couldn't run the generator. Several of my Canadian Embassy friends spent time on a Canadian Naval vessel that came to help with distribution of relief supplies. One of them loved the experience but the other said it was really hard for him to see how people fought over the supplies as soon as armed guards left the scene.

In the wake of the storms, my opinion of Digicel, the Irish-owned mobile phone provider that dominates the Haitian market, remains as high as ever. The company donated $1 million to relief efforts including replacement phones and $400,000 in free phone credit for affected families.

more manba babies

Many thanks to Vanderbilt med student and amateur photographer Meghan who shared her talents to take these portraits of some of our 9-month-old babies with their moms

the trash can that changed my life

What do a trash can, a multifuction laster jet printer and 82 one-inch binders have in common? They are relatively small things that are making me very very happy these days. For the last 11 months I've been running across the large clinic compound each and every time I want to print a single page. I've been walking to the office next door to throw out my trash and since July, I've been cramming piles of data collection forms in two overstuffed binders. Those days are done.

It's so often the small things that can feel like the biggest victories here. I had been asking for a trash can since I arrived last October - but it never materialized until a week ago. Delivery of the 1-inch binders to hold each child's data forms required a month of almost daily visits to the clinic's purchasing department. Once I decided to buy it, the printer was a relatively quick acquisition. I carried it from Chicago a couple weeks ago but had to do a bit of negotiation / playing dumb at the customs counter to avoid paying crazy high taxes on it.

I can't believe how much better I feel about facing the work day knowing that things are just a little more organized and efficient. This should probably give me some hope for the future. If a trash can can change my life, who knows what something a little bigger might do?