UN shipping officer says aid delivery by ship to Haiti becoming ‘increasingly critical’

A shipping officer with the United Nations’ World Food Program (WFP) says aid delivery by ship to Haiti is becoming “increasingly critical.”

Speaking on Friday as the global body celebrated World Humanitarian Day, Captain Madeleine Habib, who manages the organization’s coastal shipping service to ensure the safe transit of essential humanitarian goods and assets to the northern and southern parts of the country, voiced concern about the need for deliveries.

“A maritime alternative is increasingly critical as gang control over the highways out of the capital continues to grow,” she added.

“This means that the Haitian population and humanitarian actors have limited freedom of movement in and out of the capital.

“The situation has a huge impact on the population’s income and on the implementation of humanitarian and development projects that should support the community,” Habib continued.

“This is especially true for the population of the southern peninsula of the country, which is still suffering from the devastating impact of the August 2021 earthquake.”

She said farmers in the south of Haiti are struggling to get their goods to markets.

“One year after the disaster, I recognize that thousands of people, especially in the south, are still struggling to recover and are unable to rebuild their lives because the growing insecurity in Port-au-Prince has shattered their economic prospects,” Habib said. “Farmers in the rural south are unable to get their produce to markets, so their livelihoods are suffering.

“It takes a village, and the supply chain is an essential part of that village,” she added. “We might not be on the frontline, but our network of trucks, ships, and planes keeps essential humanitarian aid moving towards our beneficiaries.

“Our team continues to ensure the transportation of humanitarian aid to these vulnerable populations,” Habib said.

WFP said in a statement that its school feeding program is considered to be the largest food safety net in Haiti.

Every school day, WFP said it delivers hot meals to close to 300,000 children across more than 1,000 schools, mainly public, throughout the country.

The organization says it buys locally an average of 800 metric tons of food annually for the program, supporting national agriculture in line with the Haitian government’s rural development priorities.

The UN agency said it is currently providing emergency food assistance to more than 150,000 people who have been affected by a prolonged drought and the deterioration of the economic situation since 2018.

To help mitigate the impact of future disasters, WFP said it works to ensure that stocks of emergency food are on standby in the “right locations” before the start of the hurricane season, which runs from June to November each year.