Haiti: Towards and Beyond the Donors’ Conference

Summary

• Haiti’s January 12 earthquake left up to 300,000 people dead, an equal number injured, and more than a million displaced; overall damage and loss are valued at $7.9 billion, or about 120 percent of Haiti’s 2009 gross domestic product.
• The immediate international response focused on rescue, the provision of humanitarian relief and security, and cleanup.
• The March 31 Donors’ Conference in New York yielded both a Haitian-led recovery and br development plan supported by international donors and a mechanism for coordinating donor allocated resources.
• Donors pledged more than $5 billion over the next 18 months.
• Activities initiated over the next 18 months must support longer-term strategies to revitalize all of Haiti, including long neglected rural areas.
• Haiti’s decentralized recovery and development must address its debilitating inequality and poverty while strengthening the capacity of the government.

About This Brief

This report is based on a February 25 panel presentation sponsored by USIP’s Haiti Working Group to discuss “Haiti: Six Weeks Later.” The panel consisted of Reverend Tom Streit, director of the Haiti Program and research assistant professor of Biological Sciences, University of Notre Dame; Mary Beth Sheridan, diplomatic correspondent, The Washington Post; Tim Sullivan, manager of the Center for Defense Studies, American Enterprise Institute; and Dr. Robert Maguire, chairman of USIP’s Haiti Working Group and former Jennings Randolph Senior Fellow and associate professor, Trinity Washington University. Robert Perito, director of USIP’s Haiti Program, served as moderator.