By Staff, Dominican Today. Thousands of Haitians who work in banana plantations, farms, and agro-companies in northwestern Dominican Republic traditionally cross the border to visit home for the holidays. This year, Dominican authorities are not guaranteeing the return crossing, and many Haitians say they plan to stay at home anyway.
Continue reading →By Staff, Haiti Grassroots Watch. Part 5 of 7. Are low-wage, low-skilled assembly industries in Haiti really a “stepping stone” to more complex industrial development? In the Mexican maquiladora boom areas, the water table is dropping by 1 to 1.5 meters every year due to intensive use of water; the blue dye run-off from jeans pollutes rivers and irrigation ditches; 67% of homes have dirt floors, and 52% of streets are unpaved. (English | French)
Continue reading →By Staff, Haiti Grassroots Watch. Part 4 of 7. ”You get some factories and some salaries, and everything else is imported…. People need to know what FTZs are, what has happened in Mexico, or Honduras, so they don’t think these things will ‘save’ us.” – Camille Chalmers, Economist. (English | French)
By Sonia Pierre, You Tube, Courtesy of Global Fund for Children | RFK Center. Sonia Pierre was the founder and director of Movimiento de Mujeres Dominico-Haitianas (MUDHA). Sonia’s death on Sunday, December 4, 2011 is a great loss to Haiti and the Dominican Republic. (English | Spanish)
Continue reading →By Staff, Haiti Grassroots Watch. Part 3 of 7. Haiti is the only country that guarantees the U.S. market duty-free and quota-free access. With every free-trade zone that gets built on prime agricultural land, more farmers are put out of work. Thus Haitians import more food as real wages drop to rock bottom in the sweatshops, where there are now plans to legalize 3 x 8 hours work shifts. In Haiti, we sometimes talk figuratively about being eaten up. This comes pretty close to the real thing. DC (English | French)
Continue reading →By Staff, Haiti Grassroots Watch. Part 2 of 7. “It’s a big error to bet on the slave-wage labor, on breaking the backs of workers who are paid nothing while [foreign] companies get rich. It’s not only an error, it’s a crime…. [Assembly factories] work with imported materials, they’re enclaves. They don’t have much effect on the economy.” – Haitian economist Camille Chalmers. (English | French)
Continue reading →By Staff, Cuba Debate | CCS | Translated to English by Haiti Chery. CELAC is made up of 13 member nations from the Caribbean, 13 from South America, 6 from Central America, and 1 from the southern part of North America, whose leaders have agreed to promote an organization that will form a block in addressing the world’s challenges. (English | Spanish)
Continue reading →By Dady Chery, Haiti Chery. As the spirit of the Enlightenment inflamed everyone, the rebellious Haitian slaves led by Toussaint L’Ouverture would prove to be those most faithful to the Enlightenment ideals.
Continue reading →By Rebecca Morelle, BBC News. Rare footage of one of the world’s most strange and elusive mammals has been captured by scientists.
Continue reading →By Whitney Phillips, Cronkite Borlerlands Initiative | Florida Center for Investigative Reporting | El Nuevo Herald. Vigorous enforcement of new laws in the Dominican Republic means that hundreds of thousands of people of Haitian descent are finding it increasingly difficult to get access to their birth certificates, which are required to get married, obtain a high school diploma, start a business, get a driver’s license or passport. or even sign up for a phone plan. (English | Spanish)
Continue reading →By Staff Writers, SPX via Terra Daily. A team of geologists found lavas on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola – home to Haiti and the Dominican Republic – that suggest the area is underlain by rocks almost a billion years older than previously believed.
Continue reading →By Staff, Dominican Today | Radio Rebelde | |Ian James, Valley News. A recently-instaled Venezuelan-Cuban undersea cable will begin operating in July. The cable connects Cuba to the Internet via both Venezuela and Jamaica. An extension is planned to reach Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
Continue reading →By Dan Coughlin and Kim Ives, The Nation. Contractors for Fruit of the Loom, Hanes, and Levi’s worked in close concert with the US Embassy when they aggressively moved to block a minimum wage increase for Haitian assembly zone workers, the lowest-paid in the hemisphere, according to secret State Department cables. (English | French)
Continue reading →By Dan La Botz, Labor Notes. Undocumented Latino immigrants in Switzerland are battling many of the same issues as in the United States, and they’re organizing to call for creative solutions to common problems.
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