Haiti – Dominican Republic - Disasters and Conflicts - UNEP

Executive summaryThis report presents the findings, conclusions andrecommendations of an 18 month long assessmentof the border between the two countries thatshare the Caribbean island of Hispaniola – Haiti,the poorest country in the Western Hemisphereand the Dominican Republic, a middle-incomecountry. It is along this 380 km border that there isthe most contact between the two populations,and the highest likelihood of tension and conflictbetween them. It is here too that there is the greatestopportunity to have a positive impact on thecomplex relationship between the two countries.Paradoxically the challenges in the border zoneare driven both by the interdependencies of thetwo countries and by the stark contrasts in theeconomic, social and environmental conditions.These differences manifest themselves in thechronic poverty and severe environmentaldegradation seen in many areas on the Haitianside of the border, as well as illegal transboundaryexploitation of natural resources.The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)and the United Nations Development Programme(UNDP) accompanied the Governments of Haitiand the Dominican Republic, through theirMinistries of Environment, in undertaking a detailedassessment of the border area. The assessmentcovered both countries, however, emphasis wasput on the Haitian side where the information isscarce and the environmental problems are morepressing.This assessment has three complementaryobjectives:• Firstly, it sets out to assess how the use of naturalresources and environmental degradation inthe border zone are contributing to disastervulnerability, conflict risk, poverty and unsustainablepractices. This also includes assessing howresource dependent livelihoods are respondingto these challenges.• Secondly, it presents an analysis of issues andtrends, as well as of underlying driving forces,that affect the situation in the border zone.• Finally, it provides practical recommendationsfor the two governments and their internationalpartners on how to mitigate the identifiedrisks, capitalize on the opportunities, increasetransboundary environmental cooperation,and build resilience to identified areas ofvulnerability.The assessment team found that the key issuesof concern identified in the border zone can beconnected to four interlinked driving forces:• Haitian poverty, food insecurity and underdevelopmentaffect virtually all parts of theborder zone.• Environmental degradation manifests itselfmainly in soil erosion, deforestation, and adegraded marine environment.• Weak governance, especially on the Haitianside of the border, affects all facets of theeconomy and society.• Finally, the economic and resource inequalitiesbetween the two countries are the cause ofmany of the transboundary problems identifiedin the border zone.Examples of some of the key issues in the borderzone include the illegal extraction and tradeof natural resources (mainly charcoal, but alsofirewood and marine resources), agriculture, andlarge numbers of people crossing illegally fromrural areas in Haiti into the Dominican Republic insearch of livelihoods due to the degradation ofland and a surplus of labour on the Haitian side.Several of the noted problems, such as deforestationand soil erosion, are very large scale and havebeen developing for generations. Environmentaldegradation in the worst affected parts of theHaitian border zone is almost completely irreversible,due to a near total loss of vegetation coverand productive topsoil across wide areas.Several of the identified issues related to theenvironment and the use of natural resourcesalso present a short term but high instability andconflict risk to the relations between the two6 Haiti – Dominican Republic: Environmental challenges in the border zone