Answers to your questions

Last updated on Dec. 23, 2011

Q: What is Oxfam’s role in Haiti now?
A: Oxfam has been working in Haiti since 1978. After the earthquake in January 2010, we reached more than 500,000 people with our emergency response and 700,000 people with cholera prevention activities to battle the outbreak that started in October of that year.

In 2011, as we began to shift our focus to longer-term initiatives, we reached a further 532,000 people in the camps and in the wider community. We have gradually been withdrawing from more than 120 camps where we have provided emergency water, sanitation, and health education. We have handed over ownership of most of our water and sanitation programs to trained water committees and established alternative mechanisms for these services in all the camps from which we have withdrawn.

Our focus now is on longer-term development and promoting sustainable change. We are working in communities rather than camps, identifying and engaging with Haitian organizations as partners in longer-term initiatives to strengthen civil society and local capacity, and supporting employment creation through development of small enterprises. However, the fragility of Haiti’s recovery, as well as the threat of cholera and regular tropical storms, will ensure that Oxfam’s emergency response capability will always be a core part of our program.

Q: Millions of dollars in aid have been spent since the earthquake two years ago, yet more than half a million people are still living in tents and under tarps. Why has so little changed?

A: Before the earthquake struck, Haiti was an extremely poor country, with little infrastructure and limited public services. For example, only 51 percent of people living in urban areas and 17 percent of people living in rural areas had access to sanitation services.

The Haitian government needs to show stronger leadership by, for instance, taking concrete steps to establish a comprehensive strategy and timeline for re-housing the hundreds of thousands of people who remain displaced. The government has been reluctant to expropriate land for housing, despite a constitutional provision which permits the state to do so.  And part of the strategy should include the acceleration of rubble removal—about half of it has been carted off—and setting up a reconstruction plan for Port-au-Prince.

Additionally, donor pledges of funding haven’t always translated into disbursement. Of the $4.6 billion pledged by international donors for Haiti’s reconstruction in 2010 and 2011 (including $1 billion in debt relief), donors had only delivered 43 percent by the end of September 2011, according to the UN Office of the Special Envoy for Haiti. Donors and aid agencies must do more to support the government, to help it be accountable to its own people and ensure that Haitians have a say in how the country is rebuilt.

Q: Why do people have to pay for water now?

A: People in Port-au-Prince paid for clean water before the earthquake, and we are returning to that system. Nearly two years after the earthquake it is no longer economically viable for Oxfam to continue to truck free water into the camps. The cost of water trucking is $167,000 per month for Oxfam alone, and, crucially, the provision of free water hinders the development of a long-term solution to Haiti´s water needs. On several occasions, DINEPA (Direction Nationale de l’Eau Potable et de l’Assainissement), has said that if aid groups continue to provide free water DINEPA will not be able to build a permanent sustainable water system, which Haiti urgently needs. DINEPA has asked international aid organizations to stop providing free water.

In September 2011 Oxfam carried out a survey into water consumption levels in the camps where we work to see how the transition to paying for water had affected water consumption. The survey found that there has been a small drop in water consumption from 17 liters per day per person in 2010 when it was provided free, to 15 liters per day per person in 2011. This indicates that people in the camps where Oxfam works are able to pay for the water they need.

Q: Will the reduction of aid in the camps encourage more people to leave them?

A: The principle need of people still living in the camps is employment and money. Displaced people need a way to earn an income. The government, with the help of the international community, must implement a comprehensive resettlement and job-creation strategy. This resettlement strategy must ensure that the displaced people can move to a safe location and that they have long-term and sustainable access to public services, such as water and sanitation facilities, all of which will allow them to rebuild their lives with dignity. Until this is done it will be very difficult for the roughly 550,000 people who remain in camps to leave: They still have no homes to go to and no money with which to pay rent.

Q: What is the current cholera situation?

A: Following heavy seasonal rains between June and November, there was an increase in the number of cholera cases in some areas where Oxfam worked in Cap Haitian, Gressier and Port-au-Prince—areas with extremely poor access to basic water and sanitation services.  As a result Oxfam scaled up the cholera prevention work it was already doing in the Cap Haitian area and the metropolitan area of Port-au-Prince. This included: distribution of hygiene kits (which contain soap and water purification tablets), latrine construction, drainage improvement, training of staff, and mobilizing local brigadiers who go house-to-house spreading messages to the community on cholera prevention.

We are also supporting local cholera treatment centers through construction work. In partnership with the World Health Organization, we have constructed cholera isolation rooms in five different health centers.

Although hygiene messages have been constantly shared by different means, if the country is to avoid future public health crises like this one, the government of Haiti, with the support of the international community, must significantly step up investment in affordable and safe water and sanitation infrastructure, including in rural areas. Before the earthquake, 49 percent of people living in urban areas and 83 percent of people living in rural areas did not have access to sanitation services.

Q: Why is Oxfam leaving the camps when cholera is still present?

A: During the cholera epidemic, we noted that there were very few cases of cholera in the camps where Oxfam was present. This meant that our months of work on hygiene promotion had paid off, contributing to an improvement in the hygiene practices of people living there.

Though our work has shifted from the camps to the broader community, we will remain vigilant about conditions in the camps. Oxfam will continue to have a mobile team of water experts whose primary role will be to monitor and maintain water and sanitation infrastructure and guarantee the quality of services in the camps. The mobile team will have the capacity to intervene in case of any new cases of disease outbreaks in our areas.

Q: What is Oxfam doing to ensure the sustainability of its programs and fight against cholera?

A: Oxfam is working with community-based organizations to train them in sharing good hygiene practices within the community, in schools, in markets, and to be able to react when cases of cholera do occur. We are also providing material support to the Ministry of Public Health, and training camp crews to work with the ministry in order to ensure that in the long-term the government has the capacity to deal with cholera outbreaks and can carry out an effective response.

Q: What is Oxfam doing to help prevent forced evictions of people from the camps?

A: About one fifth of the 550,000 people still living in camps now face the threat of eviction because the owners of the land on which the camps sit want it back. Although the owners have a right to their land, the use of force and intimidation of displaced people is not acceptable. People living on these lands must be offered long-term, sustainable solutions to their housing needs.

When Oxfam gets information about eviction threats, it shares the details with local authorities, other aid group, and UN agencies. At the same time, Oxfam facilitates negotiations among people in the camps and land owners, involving local mayors, camp committees and the International Organization for Migration, through which short-term solutions are often reached. So far 15 extensions have been successfully negotiated.