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Tuesday, 13 February 2007 18:57 |
By JIM GENARO
Centuries of abuse and exploitation by industrialized countries, as well as internal conflicts, have left Haiti devastated economically and the ones who suffer most are the children, Tom Plaut told an audience of about 150 people at UNC Ashevilleís Humanities Lecture Hall Feb. 6.
The talk, which was presented by the World Affairs Council of Western North Carolina, was the first of its 2007 Great Decisions lecture series. The UNCA chapter of Amnesty International co-sponsored the event.
Plaut
retired in 2005 from teaching sociology at Mars Hill College, where he
also directed the collegeís Center for Assessment and Research
Alliances. He traveled to Haiti twice in 2006 to work in childrenís
medical clinics and serves on the board of directors of Mission Manna,
which sponsors the clinics.
In
understanding the context of childrenís suffering in Haiti and
elsewhere, it is important to note that children have guaranteed rights
under international law, Plaut told the audience.
Two treaties
ensure such rights ó the 1959 United Nations Declaration on the Rights
of the Child and the 1985 Convention on the Rights of the Child. The
latter of these has been signed by every country in the U.N., he noted,
except for Somalia and the U.S.
Yet despite
these assurances of protection, children throughout the developing
world are abused and exploited ó especially sexually ó with alarming
frequency, he said.
ìChildren used for sexual objects in prostitution is huge everywhere,î Plaut noted.
In Haiti ó the Western Hemisphereís poorest country ó the problem is pervasive.
The country
occupies the western one-third of the Caribbean island Hispaniola. The
Dominican Republic occupies the other two-thirds. Both nations have
about equal portions of the islandís 16.5 million people.
ìWhen you arrive
in Haiti, you are struck by the initial beauty of it,î Plaut said.
However, its natural beauty cannot mask the suffering endured by so
many of its people.
Particularly
troubling is Haitiís child-mortality rate, he added. In 2005, the
Dominican Republic suffered 7,000 deaths of young children. In Haiti
during the same period, 31,000 children died.
Lack of food and clean water is responsible for most of these deaths, Plaut noted.
ìWhen a child has malnutrition, they can look right through you,î he told the audience.
Intestinal infections, malnutrition and respiratory infections all wreak havoc among Haitiís children, Plaut said.
Intestinal
parasites are also a common threat, often resulting when parents feed
their children clay as a way of making up for deficiencies in iron ó
clay that often turns out to be infested with worms.
ìAll of this is related to living in extremely, extremely impoverished conditions,î he added.
A major
impediment to public health is the countryís lack of infrastructure ó
particularly modern hospitals. One Haitian man, when asked about the
conditions of hospitals there, told Plaut, ìYou only want to come here,
maybe, for dying ó so they can put you in the morgue and bury you. You
donít want to come here for healing.î
One tool that
has been greatly helpful in combating malnutrition is AK1000 ó a soup
mix made of corn, beans, rice and other grains that can be made cheaply
and provides all the nutrients children need. For a cost of 60 cents, a
family of four can survive for three days on the mix, Plaut said, and
it has become a major staple of relief efforts in Haiti.
He related a story of coming across a woman resting in the middle of the woods with a severe infection.
ìShe lies down on her mattress in the middle of the forest and waits to get better ó or not,î Plaut said.
His team had some antibiotics with them and administered them to her, but they could not stay around to see if she got better.
ìYou just go, bit by bit, as best you can,î he said.
In a country where life expectancy is just 52 years old, such scenes are commonplace.
ìWhen you think about why people want to come to the U.S., this is one of the reasons,î Plaut told the audience.
Many of Haitiís problems stem from its exploitation by other countries ó particularly France and the United States, he said
Founded as a
French slave colony, Haiti once provided 40 percent of all the sugar
consumed in Europe and 60 percent of its coffee, Plaut said.
ìIt was a huge cash cow for France,î he said. ìIt was called the ëPearl of the Antilles.íî
Home to
one-third of the entire Atlantic slave population, Haiti had more than
500,000 people by 1700 ó in an area roughly one-third the size of South
Carolina, he noted.
In 1791, spurred
by the revolutions in France and the U.S., the Haitian slaves revolted.
A bloody war ensued, with more than half the population dying in the
fighting. But by 1804, Haiti had won its independence, making it the
worldís first black republic.
Franceís
shocking defeat also ìled Napoleon to give up on his dreams of an
empire in the Western Hemisphere,î Plaut said, prompting him to sell a
vast region of what is now the U.S. ó the Louisiana Purchase, as it is
called by historians.
Nonetheless,
Haitiís victory was not warmly received in the U.S., where fears of a
slave rebellion in the Southern states prevented Washington from
recognizing Haiti until after the Civil War, Plaut said.
But most
devastating to the new republicwas a fee imposed by France as a
condition of its recognition of the countryís independence. Haiti was
forced to pay $150 million ó the equivalent of $2 billion today ó for
the loss of property in the form of slaves and land that France
incurred as a result of losing the colony.
As a result, ìit went from being a very wealthy colony to being a very bankrupt independent state,î Plaut said.
In the 19th
century, an economic blockade by France and the U.S. destroyed Haitiís
economy, eventually forcing it to default on loans that were taken out
with American banks to pay off the debt to France. Those banks appealed
to President Woodrow Wilson to intervene, prompting the U.S. to invade
and occupy the country from 1915 until 1934, Plaut noted.
The result of
these events and of exploitation by corrupt leaders ó most notably the
American-backed dictatorships of father and son pair FranÁois and
Jean-Claude Duvalier ó left the country bankrupt, impoverished and
lacking in infrastructure.
Nonetheless, Plaut said, the resilience of Haitiís people is remarkable.
ìThe strength of these people is just stunning. They work extremely hard,î he told the audience.
A common sight
in Haiti, he said, is men sitting on the side of a road in the
scorching sun, cutting out metal sheets by hand with intricate designs
to be sold to tourists.
ìDonít tell me these people are not hard-working, disciplined people,î he added.
Yet the average income in Haiti is just $450 per year, compared to $44,000 per year in the U.S., Plaut noted.
Even when the
difference in purchasing power that money has in Haiti is factored into
the equation, people in the U.S. still have 23 times as much buying
power per capita as Haitians.
International
free-trade agreements have also had a devastating toll on Haitiís
economy, Plaut said. In 1995, the International Monetary Fund forced
Haiti to drop its tariffs on rice from 35 percent to just three percent.
ìThis was just disastrous for Haitian rice farmers,î he said. ìThey just couldnít compete.î
But those who
suffer the most, he said, are the children. Between 2000 and 2005,
150,000 Haitian children died of hunger, diseases and other preventable
causes.
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