Haiti

1
Haiti

• Facts about poverty

2
Population

• 8,924,553 note estimates for this country
  explicitly take into account the effects of
  excess mortality due to AIDS this can result in
  lower life expectancy, higher infant mortality,
  higher death rates, lower population growth
  rates, and changes in the distribution of
  population by age and sex than would otherwise be
  expected.
• Age Structure
• 0-14 years 41.8 (male 1,881,509/female
  1,851,591) 15-64 years 54.7 (male
  2,386,761/female 2,495,233) 65 years and over
  3.5 (male 135,695/female 173,764)
• HIV/AIDS - adult prevalence rate 5.6
• Education expenditures 1.4
• of GDP
• Median age
• total 18.5 years male 18.1 years female 19
  years

3
Politics

• Haiti is one of the poorest countries in the
  western hemisphere and the poverty has fuelled
  restavek, a system of domestic servitude of
  hundreds of thousands of children that is
  tantamount to modern-day slavery.
• The countrys government acknowledges that
  child slaves exist but says it is part of the
  culture.

4
Environmental issues

• Periodic flooding was caused by erosion and
  deforestation
• Houses there are made out of cardboard and any
  other type of soft material
• 3, 006 people died in 2004, because of a tropical
  storm called Jeanne
• Earlier in 2004, floods killed 3, 000 people
• Recently, on the 10th of September 2008, there
  were 331 dead and 800, 000 in need of
  humanitarian aid.

5
Food crisis

• more than 70 of Haitians live on less than 2 a
  day
• Rising food prices
• Hurricane Jeanne destroyed 80 of total crop
• Result ? food shortage and rioting
• Eating mud cookies
• Cant afford staple food (e.g. rice)
• Import much food ? Dependence

6
Religion in Haiti

• About 95 of the population follows Christianity,
  however denominations vary. Roman Catholicism is
  the official state religion and approximately
  80, of the population belongs to this religion.
  An estimated 15 of the population follows the
  teachings of various Protestant churches such as
  , Pentecostal, etc. As of 2007 there were 14,772
  Jehovah's Witnesses in Haiti.
• The New World Afro-diasporic religion of Voodoo
  is also practiced in rural areas. The religion is
  very similar to other regional variations such as
  Brazilian Candomblé, Cuban Santería, and
  Espiritismo of Puerto Rico.

7
Social and cultural life in Haiti

• Caribbean drums
• French-speaking
• Public relations
• Voodoo