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Haiti: City of Jacmel to close last earthquake camps
(Reuters) – Efforts are underway to move the last homeless quake survivors from camps in the city of Jacmel, Haiti, into rented accommodation over the next three months, marking the closure of all the city’s camps, the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) has said.
A month ago, 2,891 Haiti citizens were still living in the last four of 36 makeshift camps set up in the southern port city of Jacmel following the devastating earthquake that hit the Caribbean nation in January 2010, according to the latest IOM figures.
It is hoped that relocating the displaced families will help relaunch the city’s ailing tourism industry and arts and crafts sector, which are important sources of income for many of its 41,000 residents.
Each family will be given a year’s rent subsidy and extra financial and transport assistance to help them move their belongings from the camps into housing.
Elsewhere in Haiti, there are still 390,000 people living in 575 makeshift camps and settlements, about a quarter of the total displaced by the earthquake, according to latest figures from the IOM.
Many of the remaining camps are dotted in and around the capital Port-au-Prince. Here many Haiti citizens struggle to survive in flimsy tents and shacks made from bed sheets, tarpaulin and scrap metal, with limited access to clean water and sanitation.
Poor hygiene means Haiti’s homeless face a renewed threat of cholera as the hurricane season gets underway, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) recently warned.
So far, a cholera epidemic has claimed more than 7,000 lives and infected over half a million Haiti citizens since it began in October 2010.
Since the earthquake, 14,000 families have received a US$500 subsidy to cover rent payments for up to a year, encouraging them to leave the camps, according to the IOM. In addition, around 13,000 families have received assistance to repair their damaged homes.
But the government of Haiti and international aid community have been criticised for the slow pace of resettlement.
Families living in camps want to leave but many have nowhere to go. Most camp residents do not own any land and few new permanent homes are being built in Port-au-Prince.
Efforts to resettle homeless Haiti citizens in new housing or repaired homes have been hampered by political uncertainty, weak coordination and the cholera epidemic, along with longstanding land tenure problems.
A shortfall in funding for activities to improve access to healthcare, clean water and sanitation is also a concern. According to the U.N. humanitarian agency (OCHA), the 2012 appeal for Haiti is the least funded in the world – so far only 19 per cent of the US$230 million requested has been received.