In Haiti, nearly 90 percent of poor and 67 percent of extremely poor households live in rural areas. Basic infrastructure in these areas (such as feeder roads, potable water, irrigation and sanitation) is absent or severely depleted, reinforcing people’s isolation and exclusion. According to the Household Living Conditions Survey draft report of 2003, only 11 percent of rural households had access to electricity. Restoring basic services and creating opportunities for these rural populations is essential in promoting human welfare, economic growth and greater social stability.
Strengthening partnership to build rural capacity is the operative principle at all levels of this IDA-supported project that transfers public resources directly to organizations in poor rural communities and in peri-urban communities on the outskirts of cities. This project, which is executed by the Haitian Ministry of Planning, finances community self-help efforts to meet local priorities through basic infrastructure upgrades, job creation, and new skills that develop social capital. The average grant size is US$17,500, with community organizations providing counterpart labor to implement project activities and operate and maintain their new assets. Greater citizen participation in local project decision making helps improve planning and outcomes, while fostering social cohesion and good governance helpful in taking on and solving new problems.
As of May 2009, 615 locally selected projects had been planned and carried out in 59 communes from all 10 regional departments, as rural residents mobilized to use public funding to meet a range of local needs—from installing water pumps to opening community shops and building schools.
Highlights:
- Over US$10.75 million was invested in community-led projects (not including the technical assistance and training provided to participant groups).
- About 4,030 community-based organizations (CBOs) are actively engaged in 59 democratically-elected project development communal councils (COPRODEPs). These assemblies of elected representatives from community-based organizations (80 percent) and representatives from town hall (20 percent) make all decisions about implementation of subprojects in their jurisdictions. Each COPRODEP elects an executive committee to manage funds for subprojects and conducts on-the-ground supervision. Thirty-two percent of elected committee members are women.
- The Ministry of Planning, using contracted service providers, has carried out 788 training sessions to build the management capacity of select community organizations
The following chart categorizes subprojects by productive, social and infrastructure sector, showing the major subproject types and their investment shares.
Subprojects by Sector
The Community-Driven Development Project. or CDD (PRODEP in French), is financed with two IDA grants totaling US$46 million. The initial grant of US$38 million was approved in July 2005, with a follow-on grant of $8 million approved in January 2009. The CDD project is scheduled to close in June 2010.
- Approximately 1,450 local subprojects are expected to be implemented by project’s end.
- Community-driven development is now being introduced in more volatile urban areas. A new national Urban CDD project (PRODEPUR) was launched in November 2008, financed by a US$15.7 million IDA grant and US$4 million from the Caribbean Development Bank. PRODEPUR will fund approximately 380 subprojects in 10 of 17 poor urban “Priority Zones”; identified by the Government of Haiti across five municipalities.
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