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The disadvantaged remain disadvantaged no matter how much money hotels and restaurants manage to make every year.

From their campaign speeches all the way to the construction sites of their abandoned projects, it’s easy to detect the cracks in the promises made by Haitian politicians to develop the tourism sector. Every time we elect a new president, we hope that they will achieve the dream of revitalizing the tourism sector. However, these projects are usually abandoned soon after elections.

The Coronavirus is a prime example of how vulnerable an economy that relies too much on tourism is. Travel restrictions do not only affect airport workers. A country that depends on  traveler dollars to eat experiences a labor degradation. The entire economy takes the blow. If a government does  not have a plan in place to continue paying unemployed workers during a travel hault, we see as a result, more hunger and poverty. Many local businesses will be forced to shut their doors, and an increase in crime rates.

Corruption is so rampant in Haiti that we are already used to having to fend for ourselves. However, this global pandemic has exposed further the failings of capitalism in providing for basic necessities such as healthcare, food, and financial support to the most vulnerable among us. You realize quickly that functioning in this capitalist society, which does not provide a fraction of the return of the energy you exert to earn a living, should be questioned. A system which never provided any support to you, even before Covid-19; a system based on making a few rich and keeping most poor, should not simply be reformed. If we truly care about the country, we must completely change course and destroy that system.

The development of the tourism industry is not a new concept for Haiti. We’ve been here before. It is true that a sector of the population makes some money when foreigners vacation in Haiti, but this bit of financial growth does not negate the degree to which the government has neglected hospitals, schools, local production, and environmental protection. The profit that the tourism sector brings in does not circulate in the local economy, the government does not invest that money back into its people. That money goes back to the foreign entrepreneurs who invested in the first place. This is why in many popular tourist sites, the people living in poverty near them never see a change in their living conditions. The disadvantaged remain disadvantaged no matter how much money hotels and restaurants manage to make every year.

Let us not forget that the expansion of many of these touristic projects  are done through the forceful seizing of land where communities are already planting, eating, and selling. In the touristic renovation projects that were done in Ile A Vache, several of these injustices were enacted with armed forces,  illegal arrests, and with a violent disregard for the cries of those affected. On several occasions we have seen and heard  the inhabitants of the island testify  what they were forced to sacrifice through coercion tactics so construction sites could open on their private land. The state did not make any provisions to tend to the basic needs of these people, nor did they think to relieve the hunger these  families would face as they ran their tractors over their farms to make way for touristic leisure.

It is important for us to also pay attention to the effects these projects have on the environment, specifically on how much deforestation is required to build these new hotels and beaches. The toxic waste these ships discard into our oceans every time they dock is a huge disruption to the health of our ocean life, not only in Haiti but in the whole Caribbean in general. Swimming in the ocean is not the problem, but when a country turns this activity into a business for profit, in times of excess, humanity and nature are in trouble. Large numbers of people drinking, eating, discarding their waste into the water, boats docking and dropping their waste when they arrive are all  guilty of destroying our coral reef, which is essential to marine life. It is the ocean’s life support, it is a protective layer on the stones, without it the stones will erode. The stones are a resting place for fish eggs, and a source of nutrients for animals like algae. With these touristic  invasions the presence of the coral is threatened, and if it were to disappear completely the entirety of marine life would disappear with it. Scientists have said this could happen as early as the year 2048.

If we do not take a drastic turn in addressing the current economic crisis, the entire system will crumble with us all, no matter the social class. We need to be honest with ourselves, and admit that our institutions such as health, education, public safety, are in disarray. Now is not the time to adopt centrist measures. We must consider and take the most radical approach to address the misery which has been plaguing us for the past decades. It is time for us to think better and divorce Haiti from policies which have reduced its autonomy. Policies that have convinced us that countries like Haiti exist only to provide leisure to citizens of powerful countries and to prop up economic growth of those countries. 

It is true that economic and infrastructure developments are important. However, it is in our best interest to ensure that the industries in which we invest will not cause cause us to suffer in the long run. Given the environmental threat that looms, we must ensure that our current ambitions and complicity in capitalism do not destroy it all for future generations.

Photo by Josiah Weisson Unsplash