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TechnoratiStarving Haiti Needs Help From America
It's the middle of the day; the sun is up, the heat is rising in Port-au-Prince, the capital of Haiti. Thousands of young men and women fill the streets, lining up, moving from place to place. They are looking for work, any work, work that might pay them enough to eat -- for hunger is on the march here. Garbage is carefully sifted for whatever food might be left. Young babies wail in frustration, seeking milk from a mother too anemic to produce it.
Haiti is an epicenter of the global food crisis. Its people live on the margin of survival. According to the U.N. World Food Program, the largest and most effective food aid organization here, 56 percent of the population exists on less a $1 a day; 60 percent of household cash goes to food.
Hunger is a constant companion. Sixty-one percent of all children under 5 are anemic; 46 percent of women. Nearly half -- 47 percent -- of all Haitians are malnourished.
But now the price of rice, wheat, flour and oil has doubled in the last year. In October, $4.50 was sufficient to buy two full meals; now that money would buy one meal. Haiti only produces 43 percent of its food needs; it imports more than half. Food aid provides only 5 percent.
Now hunger is spreading; mass starvation is threatened. Earlier this month, Haitians rioted in anger over soaring food prices; and the legislature dismissed the former prime minister. On Sunday, a new prime minister, Ericq Pierre, was nominated.
Pierre is an experienced diplomat, former senior adviser to the Inter-American Development Bank. He understands that U.S. friendship is vital. In his first statements, he put priority on stopping the drug trade. Needless to say, he was concerned that Haitians temporarily in residence in the United States not be sent home. Remittances from the United States are Haiti's leading source of revenue, larger than any export. He looks to extend the agreement that keeps U.S. markets open to Haitian textiles, clothing that Haitians finish and ship back to the States. He hopes for debt relief. Impoverished Haiti sends $70 million a year back to the World Bank, headed to $100 million. He needs that money to invest in schools in infrastructure, in agriculture. And finally, he says Haiti needs food aid now to stem the upheaval that will come from spreading desperation.
Here is where America has an opportunity to demonstrate we see the Haitians as human, as neighbors. President Bush, who has grown ever more unpopular at home and isolated abroad, can use this crisis to demonstrate leadership. Why not set up a program to ensure that every Haitian child has a school to attend, that supplies a book pack and a breakfast and lunch? We could help educate and feed the next generation of Haitians.
The wealth of America is most visible from these shores. Faced with a desperate economy, Haitians are not going to get a rebate from their government. The situation of this tiny nation of 9.2 million is getting worse. Last week, more than 20 Haitians died as their boat capsized trying to make it to America. Desperation will drive many more to make the attempt.
America, of course, is experiencing its own troubles. Soaring food and gas prices are squeezing budgets here also. The recession is likely to get worse before it gets better, despite the tax rebates arriving in the mail. Can America respond to its neighbors even when its own economy is in trouble, when many of its own citizens are worried about their future? It is an unfair challenge, perhaps. But hunger won't wait for our economy to recover.
--Jesse Jackson
© Copyright 2008 Digital Chicago, Inc.
18 Comments so far
Show AllI agree with lizard. The best thing this violent, greedy and dishonest country could do is to stay away. Remember Mossadegh, Lumumba, Trujillo, Aristede etc. etc. etc. Our interventions are responsible for so many decades of poverty, hunger, trouble and death in the world.
If we want to do something, sidestep the US government and give money directly for food shipments through an NGO.
C'mon Jesse. Go downtown and look and the homeless people there and know that there is an empty HOUSE for every homeless person in America.
We're a "CHRISTIAN NATION" and that's how we treat our family.
Those Haitians are going to starve or somebody else is helping them. Not the US.
That's what it means to be a christian nation.
I have only seen the shoreline of Hispaniola - never actually been in Haiti or the Dominican Republic. Haiti is an extremely poor country. Beyond poor. I read somewhere that Haiti is perhaps the poorest country in the western hemisphere and arguably in the world.
That being said, I believe that the USA not able to help the people of Haiti. The USA has much better use of its money - financing the Iraq genocide for example. Non-profit international humanitarian organizations will help Haiti out the best it can; but the USA Government itself, I believe, simply will not be involved. Much like the Darfur crisis, Haiti will be handled via several internation organizations.
But they don't have any oil.
I seem to recall the USA "helping" Hatians a few times in the past....bullets are very filling appearantly
Good reminder, ceecee, to fund charities. Crop Walk and CRS are in Haiti, too, but it looks like they aren't helping enough.
Bush's obsession is having Congress okay 90 billion dollars for more atrocities in Iraq, and Congress will pass this obscenity. While Haitians starve.
Again, the Pope visited Bush two weeks ago. Guess he forgot to bring up the starving Haitians issue in their conversation.
"President Bush ... can use this crisis to demonstrate leadership."
Err, Jesse, maybe if President "democracy-supporter" Bush hadn't overthrown Haiti's democracy this wouldn't have happened.
What disappointing comments. Hardly anyone wants to know what they can do to help. Here's one organization that I know of that is trying to get food to the poor in Haiti: www.foodforthepoor.org. It is a Christian organization. I'm sure you can find a secular one if you like. I like this one because only 4% of its costs go to administration and the other 96% goes toward food relief.
Haiti is a mess for many reasons, and the solutions need to go far beyond handing out food, but people are starving now and this is a start.
Check out the ratio of administrative costs to program costs on most charities at charitynavigator.org.
TreeFitz:
You evidently have not read "Camp of the Saints." It is becoming closer to reality everyday. Third World overpopulation threatens us all. It is at the root of all these food troubles.
So now Haiti needs "help" from Americans. From the same Americans that believe Jesus would "support our troops", drive an SUV, be against drugs (for the kids of course), and vote in elections?
Jesse, what exactly will these "Americans" do for Haiti?
"Starving Haiti Needs Help From America"
Starving Haiti needs help from every G7 government and others! Get with the program, Jesse Jackson - AMERICA IS BROKE! Why don't you get your ass in gear and confront those people in the WTO,IMF,WORLD BANK and STOCK EXCHANGES who are responsible for the global crisis' we are facing today?
Get the money from the people who have it instead of taking the easy way out by placing the burden of the world on the tax-payers of America!
I've been musing about an old 'joke'. It goes something like this (and it isn't very funny). Imagine you live in a world where the only way you can eat is by using six-foot long spoons. In hell, people can only starve to death in such a world because no one can feed themselves with a six-foot utensil. In heaven, people use the long spoons to feed each other.
I'd like to see a world in which all humans, all governments, all sectors of humanity agree that our first priorioty in this life is to take care of one another. At a minimum, every human born on this planet should be considered to have an ownership interest in the planet and its resources. At a minimum, every human should have enough to eat, clothing on their back and decent shelter with running water because the human body literally needs water to live.
If we made this our top priority, almost everything about our culture would have to shift.
Manna from heaven would be ours each day, if only we would choose it to be thus.
I wish the putatively Christian neocons and other putatively Christian conservatives would embrace the Christ's message and accept that our first and only priority as human beings is to love one another.
Instead of going to war, for any reason or so-called justification, I wish we would turn the other cheek.
I have a hunch that if here in America, we treated every single human with love, ensuring that every single human had food, clothing and decent shelter, it would be very hard for demogogues in other parts of the world to fan flames of hatred toward America. If the struggling masses in the Mid East believed that America was a land of milk and honey for everyone, they would not want to bomb us out of existence. They would want to get in on the love. I believe the single most powerful thing we could do to combat international terrorism, which seems rooted in envy and lack, would be to make love our top priority. It would take time but, gradually, it would be difficult to persaude a young Arab who believes he has no prospects in life so he might as well become a suicide bomber if this young man were able to believe, in any possible way, that he, too, could get his needs met, have food, shelter and love.
I know these thoughts are not directly targeted towards Haiti. I'm sitting here feeling way bruised by all the ugliness in the world. I am horrified to read these statistics about Haitians. These are not abstract statistics. The Rev. Jackson is talking about human beings starving.
I am sorry that Rev. Jackson rushed at the end of his essay, rushing in his suggestion that Bush should make giving all Haitian children a school and a book, as well as food a priority. Yes, we do have the resources to do this, just as we have the resources to feed and educate all the hungry children in this country. But in his plea to feed the starving, it seems like unnecessary obsfucation to ask for schools and books. And his suggestion that Bush, what, start acting like a caring leader, that is facile, isn't it? Bush doesn't care about starving children. Let's accept that and stop beating that old drum. No way is Bush going to build schools and buy books, in Haiti or anywhere else. Let's stop wasting our commons, this space we share for dialogue, with unrealistic dreams about Bush. He's almost gone, that's the best we can do.
I am saddened to read the comment that suggests that we ought to take care of our own before we help others. I think all humans need to get, really GET, that starving, suffering humans anywhere on the globe are 'our own'.
Mr.Jackson should understand, but doesn't, that one needs America like one needs a hole in the head. The poverty of Haiti is American made. The world doesn't need America's help, the world needs for America to stop subverting governments for its benefit. America needs to be put on a leash. America is no leader, America is a killer. Who wants that kind of help? This is Jackson's second article I have seen with this message. He seems to still believe America can do good. On what grounds?
"Here is where America has an opportunity to demonstrate we see the Haitians as human, as neighbors."
They've hoped for that since Jefferson took Office.
Our response, since even-then?
"Let them eat dirt..."
So did the citizens of New Orleans and many other cities along the gulf need help. They got some plastic bags of melting ice and Blackwater troops to protect them. So send FEMA to Haiti and see how much they help.
"In the very period when Bush claimed that he was waging war in Iraq in order to bring "democracy" to the Middle East, his administration did whatever it could to help bring down one of the only democratically elected governments in the history of Haiti. From the moment he took office Bush cut off economic aid to impoverished Haiti and supported reactionary forces opposed to Aristide. And for months he refused repeated requests from both the Haitia! n gove! rnment and the Congressional Black Caucus for the U.S. or the UN to provide peace-keeping troops to Haiti-only to send hundreds of troops into Haiti within hours of Aristide's departure!"
Hey, JJ, "we've" done enough down there for now, okay? Let's feed our own 30+ million who go hungry everyday first before we start feeding the rest of the world...
I'm sure Bush could fix it by sending U.S. troops there with a budget in the BILLIONS. oh wait, that'll probably make it worse...
bidelo, ditto that. Why didn't Jackson mention that little business about Western gov'ts overthrowing Haiti's democratically elected government? And then compelling Haiti to import 80% of its rice.