Today we are sharing a new video about Cleofé Neyra, a farmer in Peru’s northern province of Piura. In 2005 she participated in a demonstration against an illegal mining exploration operation in an environmentally sensitive area of her community and was abducted and tortured, and eventually released after three days. She and the 27 others who survived this ordeal (one man died) asked the government to investigate the police and mine security officers allegedly involved and prosecute those responsible for these human rights violations. Instead, prosecutors charged the campesinos who organized the demonstration with terrorism.

There’s nothing like an unjust terrorism accusation to shut someone up, especially in Peru, but the government finally agreed to investigate more thoroughly when someone leaked photos taken of the detainees to Peru’s National Human Rights Coordinator. The images showed farmers bound, gagged, hooded, and in one case dead. The resulting report and publication of these photos brought some attention to this case. Read the rest of this entry »

After the quake in Chile. Photo by Victor Ruiz Caballero/Reuters, courtesy of Alertnet.

There’s a tendency to compare disasters, and I am sure many of us started to do that Saturday morning when we heard about the 8.8-magnitude earthquake in Chile. Another earthquake! Is it like the one in Haiti?

The answer is of course no, Chile is a completely different place. Although the earthquake was a significantly stronger (something like 500 times stronger than the 12 January Haiti quake, if that is even possible), it hit a much less densely populated area with a government equipped with resources to respond.

I immediately remembered an article on the BBC web site I read two days after the now infamous Port-au-Prince quake last month. It attempted something incredibly difficult: comparing the relative size, death toll, economic impact, proximity to urban areas and the poverty and population density in affected areas of three earthquakes in China (2008), Italy (2009) and Haiti (2010). Read the rest of this entry »

Ever stop to consider where the money you spend gassing up your car actually goes? It is surprisingly hard to find out. We’ve just released a short animation “Follow the money” to raise awareness about how important it is for people to know where the money generated by resources like oil or gas goes and the need to use resource revenues to help poor communities.

Check it out and share it with your friends. And if you want to make sure that companies and governments have to disclose where all the money goes, join our effort to pass the Energy Security Through Transparency Act of 2009 (S. 1700).

A few years ago I actually attempted to “follow the money.”  I walked into the town hall of  Sadiola, Mali—a community near the border of Senegal—and asked the mayor how much money Sadiola got from the gold mine in town, which produced about half a million ounces of gold that year. The government of Mali owns part of the mine, and Balla Sissoko—the mayor—said that the government gave the town about US$500,000 each year, but he did not know what portion of those funds were generated by payments made by the mining company to the central government.

Read the rest of this entry »

Severe deforestation is one of the underlying causes of poverty in Haiti. Photo by Abbie Trayler-Smith/Oxfam.

The earth was still shaking in Haiti when the questions started. Among the toughest and most important: Just why is Haiti the poorest country in the western hemisphere?

Economist Tyler Cowen offers a few theories in his blog Marginal Revolution. (Thanks to Yale economist Chris Blattman for the reference.) Cowen proposes the historic (premature independence), financial (huge debt to France that took 100 years to pay off following the revolution), agricultural (ways of growing coffee and sugar cane).  And of course, there is the political (the Duvalier clan wrecked Haiti). Cowen concludes that he is not particularly satisfied with any of these reasons. Read the rest of this entry »

Representatives from a dozen countries are meeting in Montreal today to start the discussion about how to rebuild Haiti. Oxfam released its recommendations in a briefing paper called “Reconstructing Haiti.” The main points are pretty similar to those made following other major disasters:

Let the UN play the main coordinating role, put the people of Haiti at the center of the process, and make certain the poor people of Haiti have a clear role, so their needs are prioritized.

A pro-poor reconstruction program in Haiti could help the country improve its environment, help farmers earn a decent living, build earthquake resistant homes and schools, and change millions of lives for the better. To succeed, these efforts must prioritize poor communities. 

Just a few days after the earthquake Tracy Kidder had an op-ed in the New York Times that recommended “The ultimate goal of all aid to Haiti ought to be the strengthening of Haitian institutions, infrastructure and expertise.” It is pretty good advice coming from the author of the excellent book “Mountains Beyond Mountains” about Dr. Paul Farmer and his Partners in Health organization. I would only add that strengthening institutions that represent the needs of poor people will help the reconstruction process deliver for all of Haiti.

Oxfam spends a lot of time and resources working to promote strong institutions. This is an essential part of our approach: Poverty will not end until an empowered citizenry can change power relations. In Haiti, however, many institutions and organizations were badly damaged or even destroyed, so the human institutions, infrastructure and expertise Kidder cites as essential may be the hardest to find right when they are needed the most.

Yolette Etienne. Photo by Carolyn Gluck

It’s been a week since the earthquake in Haiti. As the media made it to the island late last week, some amazing stories emerged. These are accounts of survival, certainly, but also stories of the incredible strength and perseverance of the people of Haiti who are leading the recovery.  

One of them is about Oxfam’s director in Haiti for the last 10 years, Yolette Etienne. She was in the office when the quake hit, and immediately sought medical aid for colleague and fellow citizen Amadee Marescot, and was with him when he died hours later. Like the rest of our staff, she needed to check on her family, but when she went home she says “I found my house destroyed, and my mom dead…I buried my mom in my garden.” Yet, hours later, she returned to work, organizing one of Oxfam’s biggest humanitarian response programs since the 2004 Asian tsunami.

Read the rest of this entry »

We will need to make a significant commitment to address poverty in Haiti lest we simply reconstruct the conditions of poverty already there before the earthquake. Photo by Jeff Antebi.

We are privileged here at Oxfam America to have some photography from Haiti taken by photojournalist (and music producer) Jeff Antebi last year, so we are incorporating his images in an audio slide show on our web site. Please have a look and a listen, the images show how poor people are working to survive in Haiti, and the audio explains some of the particular challenges they face every day.

Recovering from Tuesday’s earthquake in Haiti will not be easy. We are going to have to take a hard look at what it will take to address the chronic level of pre-earthquake poverty in Haiti, instead of simply rebuilding what was already there.

Those inclined to help can contribute to our Haiti Earthquake Response Fund. If you have already donated, we thank you and ask you to share this url with others willing to help the people of Haiti:

Oxfam America Haiti Earthquake Response Fund: https://secure.oxfamamerica.org/site/Donation2?df_id=3560&3560.donation=form1