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<font size="4"><font size="2">Haiti’s hunger crisis is no accident –
it is the direct result of US economic policies imposed on rural
Haiti beginning in the 1980s. The story of how the US undermined
Haiti’s domestic rice industry explains why a nation of farmers
can no longer feed itself. <br>
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<div style="text-align:center"><font size="4"><b>HOW THE
UNITED STATES CRIPPLED <br>
</b></font></div>
<div style="text-align:center"><font size="4"><b>HAITI’S
DOMESTIC RICE INDUSTRY by Leslie Mullin </b></font><br>
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<br>
<span style="color:rgb(0,0,255)"><i>We are all living under a
system so corrupt that to ask for a plate of rice and
beans every day for every man, woman and child is to
preach revolution</i></span> – Jean Bertrand Aristide,
Dignity 1990.<br>
<br>
The basic right to eat is at the very heart of Haiti’s
struggle for democracy. Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the radical
voice of Haiti’s poor, aptly characterized slavery when he
wrote, “<i>The role of slaves was to harvest coconuts, and the
role of colonists was to eat the coconuts.</i>” (1) To
Aristide, those who have food and those who don’t marks the
vast chasm separating Haiti’s wealthy elite from millions of
impoverished citizens: <br>
<br>
<i>The rich of my country, a tiny percentage of our
population, sit at a vast table covered in white damask and
overflowing with good food, while the rest of my countrymen
and countrywomen are crowded under that table, hunched over
in the dirt and starving. It is a violent situation, and one
day the people under that table will rise up in
righteousness, and knock the table of privilege over, and
take what rightfully belongs to them. (2)</i><br>
<br>
It’s no wonder that Haiti’s most popular party, <i>Fanmi
Lavalas</i>, chose the image of Haitian people seated around
a dining table as its emblem, signifying the overthrow of
privilege and the right of every Haitian to share the nation’s
wealth. This is not mere symbolism. In its 1990 program, the <i>Lavalas</i>
party recognized the right to eat as one of three basic
principles, along with the right to work and the right of the
impoverished masses to demand what is owed them.(3) In a very
concrete way, Aristide, Haiti’s first democratically elected
president, illustrated this commitment on the day of his
February 7th, 1991 inauguration, when he invited several
hundred street children to join him for breakfast in the
Palace garden.<br>
<br>
<b><font size="4">The Story of Rice</font></b><br>
<br>
The story of Haitian rice begins in Africa, where rice has
sustained African peoples for centuries. Rice was so basic to
the West African diet that it was an essential provision on
slave ships, accompanying captive Africans to Brazil, the
Caribbean and the southern United States. (4) Today, testament
to 10 million souls kidnapped from their homeland, every
region touched by the African diaspora has its own unique
version of rice and beans. (5)<br>
<br>
Rice cultivation in the United States is deeply rooted in
slavery. Black Rice author Judith Carney writes, “<i>Few
Americans identify slavery with the cultivation of rice, yet
rice was a major plantation crop during the first three
centuries of settlement in the Americas… By the middle of
the eighteenth century, rice plantations in South Carolina
and the black slaves who worked them had created one of the
most profitable economies in the world.</i>” (6) European
settlers knew nothing about the complexities of growing,
harvesting and threshing rice. But enslaved Africans did.<br>
<br>
A basic staple of the Haitian diet, rice has been cultivated
in Haiti since its 1804 independence. Until the 1980s, Haitian
farmers produced most of the rice consumed in Haiti. Under the
US-backed dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier and the brutal
military regimes that followed, domestic rice cultivation
began to plummet. In the space of a few decades, Haiti became
the world’s fourth largest market for American rice. By 2004,
the value of US rice exports to Haiti amounted to $80 billion.
How this colossal tragedy came about is a story of foreign
intervention, government corruption, and corporate greed
backed by ruthless repression.<br>
<br>
<font size="4"><b>1984: Growth of US Food Aid Undercuts
Haitian Farmers</b></font><br>
<br>
Food aid played a key role in undermining Haiti’s domestic
rice production. President Aristide observed, “<i>What good
does it do the peasant when the pastor feeds his children?
For one night, he is grateful to the pastor, because that
night he does not have to hear the whimpers of his children,
starving. But the same free foreign rice the pastor feeds
the peasant’s children is being sold on the market for less
than the farmer’s own produce. The very food that the pastor
feeds the peasant’s children is keeping the peasant in
poverty, unable himself to feed his children.</i>” (7)<br>
<br>
Ronald Reagan’s 1984 Caribbean Basin Initiative prompted a
major increase in US food aid to Haiti. In 1984, Haiti
received $11 million in food aid; from 1985-1988, Haiti
received $54 million in food aid. (8) The Caribbean Basin
Initiative called for integrating Haiti into the global market
by redirecting 30% of Haiti’s domestic food production towards
export crops, a plan that USAID experts systematically carried
out. The United States fully recognized that this would lead
to widespread hunger in rural Haiti, as peasant land was
converted to grow food for foreigners. Food aid was supposed
to compensate rural Haitians for this attack on their
livelihood. (9) Food aid benefits the big American companies
who grow and transport it, but wrecks local economies. As
cheap American food undersold Haitian farmers’ produce,
domestic agriculture became even less sustainable. In effect,
food aid created a dependence on foreign imports.<br>
<br>
How was the United States able to impose its will on rural
Haiti? At the time, Jean-Claude Duvalier, the son of Haiti’s
infamous dictator, Francois Duvalier, ruled Haiti. Like his
father, the younger Duvalier held onto power by controlling
Haiti’s repressive security forces. He received millions in US
aid intended to maintain US influence in the Caribbean as a
bulwark against Cuba. The Reagan administration conditioned US
aid on Duvalier’s support for the plan to restructure Haiti’s
economy. <br>
<br>
Thus began the most massive foreign intervention in Haiti
since the 1915-1934 American occupation. <br>
<br>
<font size="4"><b>1986: The Game is Rigged - Miami Rice
Invades Haiti</b></font><br>
<br>
<span style="color:rgb(0,0,255)">“<i>We cannot sell our
rice…rice is coming in from Miami, and now we cannot live,</i>"
said Emanuel Georges, manning the barricade at L'Estere. LA
Times, Dec 21, 1986 </span><br>
<br>
In February 1986, a popular uprising forced Baby-Doc Duvalier
out of power. After he fled Haiti, raiding the treasury as he
left, a military junta headed by General Henri Namphy took
power. Predictably, the United States aligned with the junta
and intensified measures to restructure Haiti’s economy. In
1987, Namphy received IMF loans valued at $24.6 million in
exchange for agreeing to slash rice tariffs from 150% to 50%,
(10) the lowest in the Caribbean. (11) He opened all of
Haiti’s ports to commercial activity (12) and agreed to stop
what little support the government had offered Haitian
farmers. Meanwhile, Haiti’s military elite saw an opportunity
to make a profit smuggling American rice.<br>
<br>
In the United States, the passage of the 1985 Farm Bill
significantly boosted subsidies to American rice growers. By
1987, 40% of American rice growers’ profits came from the
government. (13) Heavily subsidized American rice could sell
at prices far below the market value of Haitian rice. Haitian
farmers never stood a chance against this unfair competition.
<br>
<br>
In Haiti, imported American rice is called “Miami rice”
because it is shipped from Miami in sacks stamped “Miami,
FLA.” By December 1987, Haiti’s rice production had shrunk to
75% of Haitian needs. (14) Outraged Haitian peasants
barricaded highways and ports for three months to protest the
cheap American rice that had begun to flood Haitian markets.
They attacked truckloads of Miami rice with machetes, picks
and clubs, dumping rice onto the earth. <br>
<br>
The late Fr. Gerard Jean-Juste, a Haitian priest and human
rights advocate, later recalled this era: "<i>In the 1980s,
imported rice poured into Haiti, below the cost of what our
farmers could produce it. Farmers lost their businesses.
People from the countryside started losing their jobs and
moving to the cities. After a few years of cheap imported
rice, local production went way down.</i>" (15)<br>
<br>
<font size="4"><b>1990: Democracy Brings Hope</b></font><br>
<br>
By 1990, the year Fr. Jean Bertrand Aristide was elected
President in Haiti’s first democratic election, US rice
imports outpaced domestic production. (16) Aristide was the
candidate of Haiti’s popular movement Lavalas. He won with 67%
of the vote. His February 1991 inauguration marked a victory
for Haiti’s poor majority after decades of Duvalier family
dictatorships and military rule, signaling participation of
the poor in a new social order. The new administration began
to implement programs in adult literacy, health care, and land
redistribution; lobbied for a minimum wage hike; and proposed
new roads and infrastructure. Aristide enforced taxes on the
wealthy, and dissolved the rural section chief infrastructure
that empowered the paramilitary force known as <i>Tonton</i>
<i>Macoute</i>. He closed Fort Dimanche, the dreaded
Duvalier-era torture center. (17) The Aristide government met
with a large coalition of farmers’ associations and unions and
proposed buying all Haitian-grown rice in order to stabilize
the price, limiting rice imports during periods between
harvests. <br>
<br>
<font size="4"><b>1992: American Rice Inc Profits from Haiti’s
Bloody Coup</b></font><br>
<br>
Just seven months after his inauguration, President Aristide
and the democratic government were overthrown in a bloody
military coup led by General Raoul Cedras. Trained in the
United States and funded by the CIA, Cedras commanded the
Haitian Army. His regime unleashed the collective violence of
Haiti’s repressive forces against its own people. From
1991-1994, nearly five thousand <i>Lavalas</i> activists and
supporters of the constitutional government were massacred;
many others were savagely tortured and imprisoned. Rape as a
political weapon was widespread. Three hundred thousand
Haitians were driven into hiding, while tens of thousands fled
the country. <br>
<br>
Around the world and in the United States, there was a massive
outcry demanding the restoration of democracy and the return
of President Aristide. Aside from the Vatican, few governments
recognized the illegal Cedras regime, widely condemned for its
sweeping human-rights abuses. This did not stop American Rice
Inc from collaborating with the ruthless military regime to
turn a profit. In September 1992, barely a year after the
coup, American Rice Inc negotiated a nine-year contract with
the illegal Haitian government, importing American rice under
its newly formed Rice Corporation of Haiti. (18)<br>
<br>
American Rice Inc is a subsidiary of Erly Industries, a
powerful international agribusiness. The company holds an
almost monopolistic position in Haiti’s rice market. (19) In
the 1980’s American Rice Inc imported rice under its brand
Comet Rice, which constituted much of the Miami rice that
ravaged Haitian rice production at the time. (20)<br>
<br>
In the 1990s, American Rice Inc supplemented its profits in
“legal” rice imports by smuggling rice to avoid paying import
taxes. Lawrence Theriot, the Washington lobbyist for American
Rice Inc, was a former director of Reagan’s Caribbean Basin
Initiative. He had powerful friends in Washington, DC like
Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jesse Helms
(R-NC). In March 2000, the Haitian government fined the
company $1.4 million for evading Haiti’s customs duties. Jesse
Helms retaliated by withholding $30 million in US aid, and
denying high-ranking Haitian officials visas to enter the
United States. The American Securities & Exchange
Commission later found Theriot and two other American Rice Inc
executives guilty of corrupt foreign practices for smuggling
rice into Haiti. <br>
<br>
<font size="4"><b>Bill Clinton’s Crocodile Tears</b></font><br>
<br>
“<span style="color:rgb(0,0,255)"><i>The dilemma is, I
believe, the classic dilemma of the poor; a choice between
death and death. Either we enter a global economic system,
in which we know we cannot survive, or, we refuse, and
face death by slow starvation. With choices like these the
urgency of finding a third way is clear. We must find some
room to maneuver, some open space simply to survive.</i></span>”
– Jean-Bertrand Aristide<br>
<br>
Bill Clinton’s 1992 election took place during Haiti’s
repressive Cedras regime, when President Aristide lived in
exile in the United States. After Haiti’s 2010 earthquake,
Clinton famously apologized for forcing Haiti to lower its
rice tariffs during his administration. He acknowledged that
he helped big Arkansas agro-businesses reap profits at the
expense of Haiti’s rice farmers. But Clinton left a lot out of
the story. <br>
<br>
Clinton posed as mediator between the coup leaders and
President Aristide to negotiate the return of Haiti’s
democratically elected government. He took advantage of this
role to use the threat of continued repression as a bargaining
chip. While the US stalled, demanding more and more economic
concessions - displaying not-so-covert support for Haiti’s
military regime - the junta continued murdering supporters of
the constitutional government. <br>
<br>
Within this coerced context, Aristide resisted the US
neoliberal plan. He insisted that discussions demanded by the
financial institutions for the proposed sales of state-owned
enterprises include benefits for the poor – opportunities for
co-ownership, funding for health and education, reparations to
the victims of the coup. (21) Aristide would later refuse to
move forward with privatization, disband the Haitian military
over strong US objections, raise the minimum wage and bring
paramilitary leaders charged with extra-judicial killings to
justice. (22)<br>
<br>
By the time President Aristide returned to Haiti, the collapse
of the country’s rice production was a <i>fait accompli,</i>
victim of a long and deliberate US campaign waged against
Haitian farmers in collusion with successive Haitian dictators
and military regimes. Imported Miami rice constituted 80% of
Haiti’s domestic consumption. Rice smuggling was common,
enabled by the corrupt Cedras regime, which accepted bribes
instead of enforcing tariffs. (23)<br>
<br>
Nothing changed after Clinton’s apology either. Haiti’s 2010
earthquake became yet another business opportunity for foreign
corporations to overrun Haiti’s economy, while food aid,
callously tossed off trucks to desperate Haitians, meant more
revenue for US corporations. Nor should we let Clinton off the
hook for forcibly repatriating thousands of Haitian “boat
people” fleeing tyranny under the junta, and intercepting
12,000 other refugees who were illegally imprisoned at
Guantanamo Bay. <br>
<br>
<font size="4"><b>Democracy and Reparations <br>
</b></font></div>
<div><br>
<span style="color:rgb(0,0,255)"><i>Democracy asks us to put
the needs and rights of people at the center of our
endeavors. This means investing in people. In investing in
people means first of all food, clean water, education and
health care. These are basic human rights. It is the
challenge of any real democracy to guarantee them</i></span>
– Jean-Bertrand Aristide<br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>There are two opposing visions of Haiti’s future – one
projected by <i>Fanmi Lavalas </i>benefits the poor
majority; the other imposed by the United States and wealthy
foreign nations enriches international corporations and the
Haitian elite. What is clear is that Haiti’s people must
prevail over foreign profits and the wealthy elite. This means
real democracy and respect for Haitian sovereignty. <br>
<br>
-------<br clear="all">
<br>
</div>
Leslie Mullin is a member of Haiti Action Committee.<font
size="4"><font size="2">This article was originally published
in the August 2017 issue of Haiti Solidarity, newsletter of
Haiti Action Committee, and is available <a
href="http://haitisolidarity.net/in-the-news/how-the-united-states-crippled-haitis-domestic-rice-industry/"
moz-do-not-send="true">online</a>.</font></font>
<div><br>
ENDNOTES:<br>
<br>
1 Aristide, Jean-Bertrand. Haiti-Haitii? Philosophical
Reflections for Mental Decolonization. Boulder, CO: Paradigm
Publishers, 2011, p37.<br>
<br>
2 Aristide, Jean-Bertrand. Dignity. Charlottesville &
London: University Press of Virginia, 1996, p9.<br>
<br>
3 Sprague, Jeb. Paramilitarism and the Assault on Democracy in
Haiti. New York: Monthly Review Press, 2012, p57.<br>
<br>
4 Harris, Jessica B. Iron Pots & Wooden Spoons: Africa’s
Gifts to New World Cooking. New York: Simon & Schuster,
1999, p31.<br>
<br>
5 Hess, Karen. The Carolina Rice Kitchen; The African
Connection. Columbia, So Carolina: University of South
Carolina Press, 1992, p. 95<br>
<br>
6 Carney, Judith A. Black Rice: The African Origins of Rice
Cultivation in the Americas. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 2002.<br>
<br>
7 Aristide, Jean-Bertrand. In the Parish of the Poor: Writings
from Haiti. New York: Orbis Books, 1990, p67.<br>
<br>
8 DeWind, Josh and Kinley III, David H. Aiding Migration: The
Impact of International Development Assistance on Haiti.
Boulder and London: Westview Press, 1988, p98.<br>
<br>
9 DeWind, p77, p98<br>
<br>
10 Emersberger, Joe. Kicking Away the Ladder in Haiti. [web
page]. Telesur, February 20, 2015. <a
href="http://www.telesurtv.net/english/opinion/Kicking-Away-the-Ladder-in-Haiti-20150220-0027.html"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">http://www.telesurtv.net/engli<wbr>sh/opinion/Kicking-Away-the-La<wbr>dder-in-Haiti-20150220-0027.ht<wbr>ml</a><br>
<br>
11 Gros, Jean-Germaine. Indigestible Recipe: Rice, Chicken
Wings, and International Financial Institutions: Or Hunger
Politics in Haiti. SAGE Publications, Inc: Journal of Black
Studies, Vol 40, No 5 [May 2010], p981.<br>
<br>
12 Wilentz, Amy. The Rainy Season: Haiti Since Duvalier. New
York: Simon and Schuster, 1989 p279<br>
<br>
13 Aristide, Jean-Bertrand. Eyes of the Heart: Seeking a Path
for the Poor in the Age of Globalization. Laura Flynn, ed.
Monroe, ME. Common Courage Press, 2000, p12.<br>
<br>
14 Chavla, Leah. Council on Hemispheric Affairs [COHA]. Haiti
Research File. Bill Clinton’s Heavy Hand on Haiti’s Vulnerable
Agricultural Economy: The American Rice Scandal [web page].
April 3, 2010. <a
href="http://www.coha.org/haiti-research-file-neoliberalism%E2%80%99s-heavy-hand-on-haiti%E2%80%99s-vulnerable-agricultural-economy-the-american-rice-scandal/"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">http://www.coha.org/haiti-rese<wbr>arch-file-neoliberalism%E2%80%<wbr>99s-heavy-hand-on-haiti%E2%80%<wbr>99s-vulnerable-agricultural-ec<wbr>onomy-the-american-rice-scanda<wbr>l/</a><br>
<br>
15 Quigley, Bill. The U.S. Role in Haiti’s Food Riots [web
page]. Counterpunch. April 21, 2008. <a
href="https://www.counterpunch.org/2008/04/21/the-u-s-role-in-haiti-s-food-riots/"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">https://www.counterpunch.org/2<wbr>008/04/21/the-u-s-role-in-hait<wbr>i-s-food-riots/</a><br>
<br>
16 Georges, Josiane. Trade and the Disappearance of Haitian
Rice [web page]. Ted Case Studies Number 725, June 2004. <a
href="http://archive.is/20130830194250/www1.american.edu/TED/haitirice.htm"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">http://archive.is/201308301942<wbr>50/www1.american.edu/TED/haiti<wbr>rice.htm</a><br>
<br>
17 Stotzky, Irwin P. Silencing the Guns in Haiti: The Promise
of Deliberative Democracy. Chicago, IL: The University of
Chicago Press, 1997, p28.<br>
<br>
18 Chavla, Leah. COHA.<br>
<br>
19 Georges, Josiane. Ted Case Studies.<br>
<br>
20 Corbett, Bob. Washington Office on Haiti: Special Issue
Report. Rice Corporation of Haiti [web page]. November 1,
1995.<br>
<br>
21 Aristide, Jean-Bertrand. Eyes of the Heart, p31-32.<br>
<br>
22 Myths About Haiti, by Haiti Action Committee, October 2001.<br>
<br>
23 Sprague, p77.<br clear="all">
<br>
haiti action <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:action.haiti@gmail.com"><action.haiti@gmail.com></a><br>
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