Powered by IFAD

Geography, agriculture and economy

Geography

The Republic of Haiti occupies the western third of the island of Hispaniola in the West Indies, between the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. The Dominican Republic is on the country’s eastern border. Haiti’s land area is 27,750 km2, with terrain that is mainly rugged and mountainous. Ecosystems vary as a result of prevailing wind and temperature conditions. About 28 per cent of the land area is arable. Haiti is vulnerable to hurricanes, flooding, earthquakes and periodic droughts, and the effects of climate change are a crucial issue for future development.

The population of about 9.4 million (2006 World Bank est.) is growing at a rate of 1.6 per cent annually, a rate slightly lower than in past decades. The country has a high population density, with 348 inhabitants per km2. An estimated 40 per cent of Haitians are illiterate, and very few people have technical and professional education. Almost 2 million people live in the area of Port-au-Prince, the capital.

Agriculture

More than half of the population lives in rural areas, and more than half of the country’s active population depends on agriculture for their livelihood. They are mainly subsistence farmers who eke out a livelihood in the country’s diverse microclimates. Agricultural potential is limited not only by the scarcity of arable land but also by scarcity of production tools, insecure land tenure, poor phytosanitary and veterinary services, lack of research, lack of dissemination of knowledge, lack of access to credit and market linkages, and lack of infrastructure.

Agricultural production, and its contribution to the national economy, has been declining since the 1980s, but agriculture remains one of the country’s main engines of economic growth. Haiti’s principal agricultural asset is the presence of small-scale producers who are resilient and able to adapt to adverse conditions. People in rural areas have benefited from mobile phone coverage, which has improved farmers’ access to market information.
Within the agriculture sector and despite an extensive coastline of more than 1,700 km, the country’s fish resources remain largely undertapped.

Economy

Haiti has experienced an economic turnaround in recent years under the democratically elected government that came into power in 2006. According to the World Bank, inflation declined to an estimated 12.9 per cent in 2006. Now internal revenue and international reserves are stronger, and most external debts have been cleared. Prudent fiscal and economic measures have contributed to these trends, and the growth of real gross domestic product (GDP) is strengthening. But Haiti’s economy still depends to a large extent on international aid and on remittances from emigrants, which totalled more than US$1 billion in 2006. Events in 2008 underscored the economy’s vulnerability to international market volatility and the effects of the climate.

In 2006 GDP was US$5.0 billion and the annual growth rate of GDP was 2.3 per cent. Gross national income (GNI) per capita in 2006 was US$430 (World Bank). Agriculture accounted for about 26 per cent of GDP.

The United States of America is the main market for the export of goods such as manufactured textile products, mango, essential oils, cacao and coffee, and it is also the principal foreign destination for Haiti’s migrant workers. Despite the relative weight of agriculture in the economy, over half of the country’s food consumption is imported, mainly from the United States of America.

Source: IFAD