It’s Time to Do the Right Thing for Haiti
Statement by Abbey Gardner and Jéhane Sedky,
Co-Directors of the Science of Implementation Initiative
New York, 20 August 2021 – As Haitians face the aftermath of another devastating earthquake, there is much discussion about lessons learned from the failures that followed the 2010 earthquake. Some of those critical lessons can be drawn from understanding the flow of donor investments from that time and how most humanitarian and development assistance ultimately bypassed Haitian institutions and did not stay in Haiti.
In 2010, the government of Haiti requested that the United Nations Office of the Special Envoy for Haiti track donor pledges, commitments and disbursements following the March international donor pledging conference “Toward a New Future for Haiti” convened at the UN in New York. Our UN team tracked aid to Haiti from 2010-2012 in close coordination with the Haitian Ministry of Planning and External Cooperation. All data was provided directly by the donors themselves. Key facts include:
Total pledged by bilateral and multilateral donors as well raised privately by NGOs:
$13.7 billion (bilateral/multilateral pledges: $10.7 billion; raised privately by NGOs: $3.06 billion)
Humanitarian and recovery funding disbursed by bilateral and multilateral donors, 2010-2012:
- Total: $6.4 billion ($2.42 billion in humanitarian and $4.01 billion in recovery).
Humanitarian Funding disbursed by bilateral and multilateral donors, 2010-2012
- Total: $2.42 billion
- Of the $2.42 billion, 0.9 percent was channeled directly to the government of Haiti.
- Local procurement: In Haiti, one of the top bilateral donors reported that it awarded 1.4 percent of its contracts to local companies from 2010-2012.
- Cash transfers: In Haiti, only 2.4 percent of humanitarian funding from bilateral and multilateral donors in 2010-2012 was recorded as relating to cash transfer programs.
Recovery funding disbursed by bilateral and multilateral donors, 2010-2012:
- Of the $6.4 billion disbursed between 2010-2012, less than 10 percent was disbursed directly to the government of Haiti using its systems; less than 0.6
percent was disbursed directly to Haitian organizations and businesses as program grants.
Despite donor concerns about corruption and capacity in poor countries, an analysis of 36 countries in resource-poor settings shows a correlation between investment in public sector institutions and development progress as measured by internationally recognized development standards such as Harvard University’s Social Progress Index. In Haiti, this is evidenced by the creation of the only public teaching hospital outside of Port-au-Prince, the Hôpital Universitaire de Mirebalais, which is training the next generation of Haitian doctors and health care workers while providing world class medical care to hundreds of thousands of people. In addition, over the last 20 years, Rwanda received 56 percent of its official development assistance through national systems and has posted some of the strongest development progress ever documented.
There is consensus that the donor funding in response to the 2010 earthquake did not lead to the hoped-for outcomes, and a different approach to partnership in aid implementation is required. One way that Prime Minister Ariel Henry is calling on the world to heed these lessons is by asking donors to coordinate their efforts through a government coordination entity, the National Emergency Operations Center. And donors agree – a statement released by the Core Group, a coalition of donor nations to Haiti – stated that its members are “resolutely committed to working alongside national and local authorities to ensure that impacted people and areas receive adequate assistance as soon as possible.”
Donors have been promising to deliver aid through national systems since signing a declaration on improving development assistance in Paris in 2005, and have recommitted to these promises in aid effectiveness meetings in Accra (2008), Busan (2011) and Nairobi (2016). When the full use of country systems is not possible, donors agreed in Busan to provide the necessary assistance to strengthen the absorptive capacity of national institutions. In practice, this approach would lead to development assistance to be structured in such a way that it funds Haitian national recovery plans and Haitian public institutions (including ongoing operations and salaries) that are best placed to reach the poorest.
In addition to a robust response to the earthquake that is based on the concepts of accompaniment and solidarity, we urge donors to fulfill their past promises including funding the following:
- The Humanitarian Response Plan for 2020-2021 (which includes the response to the Covid-19 pandemic) is only 11% funded.
- The National Plan for the Elimination of Cholera in Haiti, which includes building a national water and sanitation system, is only 18.9% funded.
- The General Hospital in Port-au-Prince is still not operational despite promises made by donors in 2010.
Let’s not forget that Haiti is impoverished due to centuries of racism, colonialism and exploitation. We are hopeful that taking into account the knowledge gained since the 2010 earthquake, donor nations will honor their commitments, accompany their Haitian partners to implement ambitious programs to address structural poverty, and employ the aid effectiveness principles they have signed onto.
About the Science of Implementation Initiative:
The Science of Implementation Initiative (SII) was established by Dr. Paul Farmer to build upon the work of his team at the United Nations Office of the Special Envoy for Haiti (2009-2012) and the United Nations Office of the Secretary-General’s Special Adviser on Community Based Health and Aid Delivery (2013-2019). SII gathers data, conducts research, tracks funding, and provides analysis with the goal of making official development assistance more effective, equitable, transparent, and accountable from the perspective of partner countries. SII is supported by private foundation grants.
Learn more at: