Global - Technology - Review

The devastating earthquake of 2010 was only the last in a long series of setbacks which the people of Haiti have had to face. The country has had thirty three coups and a series of dictators who have governed with little regard for basic human rights. Corruption is rife, and the infrastructure, already poorly developed, has been ruined by natural disaster. It is not surprising that Haiti is the poorest country in the Americas. Occupying the western part of the island of Hispaniola in the Caribbean, Haiti had a forested landscape; but the desperate need for firewood has left hardly any trees. This has caused serious soil erosion and desertification. The capital, Port-au-Prince, suffered terribly from the earthquake and the subsequent floods and the cholera outbreak. Almost every major public building bears the scars of the tremors to a greater or lesser degree. Mangoes and coffee were historically Haiti’s greatest exports; however the once-profitable bauxite mine has now closed. Graham Greene’s novel ‘The Comedians’, also made into a film, presents a chilling picture of life in Haiti in the sixties. Haiti’s greatest tragedy is the fact that in the twenty-first century, there has been little improvement.