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Haiti Forestry
Nothing better symbolized the vicious cycle of poverty
in
Haiti than the process of deforestation. Haiti was once a
lush
tropical island, replete with pines and broad leaf trees;
however, by 1988 only about 2 percent of the country had
tree
cover.
The most direct effect of deforestation was soil
erosion. In
turn, soil erosion lowered the productivity of the land,
worsened
droughts, and eventually led to desertification, all of
which
increased the pressure on the remaining land and trees.
The
United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization estimated
that
this cycle destroyed 6,000 hectares of arable land a year
in the
1980s. Analysts calculated that, at the rate of
deforestation
prevailing in the late 1980s, the country's tree cover
would be
completely depleted by 2008.
Deforestation accelerated after Hurricane Hazel downed
trees
throughout the island in 1954. Beginning in about 1954,
concessionaires stepped up their logging operations, in
response
to Port-au-Prince's intensified demand for charcoal, thus
accelerating deforestation, which had already become a
problem
because of environmentally unsound agricultural practices,
rapid
population growth, and increased competition over scarce
land.
Most of Haiti's governments paid only lip service to
the
imperative of reforestation. As was the case in other
areas of
Haitian life, the main impetus to act came from abroad.
AID's
Agroforestry Outreach Program, Projč Pyebwa, was the
country's
major reforestation program in the 1980s. Peasants planted
more
than 25 million trees under Projč Pyebwa, but as many as
seven
trees were cut for each new tree planted. Later efforts to
save
Haiti's trees--and thus its ecosystem--focused on
intensifying
reforestation programs, reducing waste in charcoal
production,
introducing more wood-efficient stoves, and importing wood
under
AID's Food for Peace program.
Data as of December 1989
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