Category: News (Page 46 of 100)

Hi everyone,

It hasn’t made the news here much, but you may know Haiti is having problems again — this time because the government was trying to raise petroleum prices. Briefly, the price of gas went up by 38 percent, diesel 47 percent and kerosene 51 percent.

There are few things Haiti doesn’t need to import, which causes the price of those things to be much higher than we pay here. Major among those are petroleum products, from regular unleaded to diesel and kerosene. Many houses, especially in the villages, still use kerosene lamps. One of the largest local “industries” is tap-taps, Haiti’s form of public transportation. Raising gas prices causes one of two problems for everyone. One, the drivers can’t afford to buy it, or they pass that cost on to the riders. Two, no one can afford to pay for the ride, so generally everything just shuts down.

There are few peaceful demonstrations in Haiti and this wasn’t either. In fact, the country completely shut down for a couple of days. Obviously, that helps no one but it did get the government to remove the increases. But now, no one wants their kids going anywhere alone. So most of the schools in the villages haven’t been able to have their end of year classes, and our schools have not been able to give out their end of year report cards yet.

We had wanted to plan a trip down in August, but the State Department has a level 3 travel advisory, which means don’t go unless absolutely necessary – so we’ll wait!

Thank you for helping our friends in Haiti and keeping Terry’s health needs in your prayers.

Hunger facts in Haiti:

• Two and a half million Haitians live in extreme poverty.
• Almost 60 percent of the population live below the poverty line of US$1 a day.
• Rural households spend 60 percent of their income on food; the poorest groups spend more
  than 70 percent.
• Anemia affects 60 percent of children between the ages of six months and 5 years.
• Although agriculture is an important sector of Haiti’s economy, the country fails to produce enough food.
• Haiti imports more than 50 percent of its populations needs. It imports 80 percent of its main staple: rice.

Recently, a picture of a crying child caused an up roar among American people. Whether or not the picture was a true portrayal of actual conditions is up for debate. A picture of a child crying
from hunger in Haiti is just that — hunger.

Several years ago, I talked about visiting one of the churches and being in the kids Sunday school class. All they could talk about was how hungry they were. Of course, this was before the feeding programs, but that hunger is still in Haiti and kids still go without.

Thankfully, we have met much of that need in “our” villages because many of you give yearly for these programs, or your church does. Just saying “thank you” really doesn’t cover what it means to those who benefit from it.

Why a picture of an empty rice bag? I saw this on the ground after the rice had been poured into a big pot and I thought, some one at home paid for that to feed these kids. Why I picked it up is your guess, but this is what they buy with the money you give. You can see where it came from. 12.5 Kg is about 27.5 pounds (why they chose that rather than 25 pounds is your guess too).

Thank you for supporting programs like this. Terry and I hope all of you are blessed for helping.