Food Consumption Patterns Part 2

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82 Enforcement is, need we add, non-existent. Nor are there courts and lawyers competent to deal with adjudicating relevant cases Neither MARNDR nor MIC were able or willing to provide the consultants with a single document that defines the law (the document cited above and included in Annex 16 came from a secretary acting independently of the Ministry) Most of the Haitian government websites are, to put it bluntly, facades with nothing behind them, no data, no downloadable documents. Click a hyperlink or downloadable document and in the vast majority of cases one gets nothing except perhaps a “site under construction.’ Associated service provider sites offer little data as well, other than typically contacts to lawyers or agents with the offer of facilitating access to the market for fees MIC staff referred the consultant to the “Director” who knew nothing but recommended a lawyer, saying, ‘he knows’ According to distributors (see contact list) there are zero controls on patents or use of copyrighted advertisements, for example Spider Man, evident in the “vitamin sticks” from China (see Figure 30 above) No inspection labels exist, despite laws mandating them When we visited three local peanut producers, having gotten their contact information from jars of peanut butter in supermarkets, we arrived at impoverished households with zero phytosanitary controls. It never occurred to any of them that they could be inspected by a government official Imported eggs and breads available in the top Port-au-Prince Supermarkets have no expiration dates One distributor/informant interviewed during the course of the research proudly proclaimed that, “Haiti has more laws governing distribution than the US ….” It is difficult to verify whether this is true, since they are neither applied nor published. But the most important point that the businessman was making is that those laws that are applied are there to protect big business—such as his own. There are no active consumer laws. In short, it is a paradise for unethical and locally connected business owners, but a prospective nightmare for consumers who may fall sick from products. Elite, Imports, Corruption, Political Instability and the Stacked Deck In the absence of government regulations seen above, any endeavors to import must consider the competitive advantage of those already importing and in control of the customs houses and ports. Figure 32 on the following page uses edible oil imports to illustrate the problems with corruption and favoritism, and elite control of customs houses. Haiti produces no edible oil and, as seen earlier, the population is on the margin of survival regarding edible oil consumption. Biologically, the Haitian population cannot survive with significantly less oil than is imported in the maximum years seen in Section 5. Yet, with the lone exception of the year 2002—more than 2 times higher than the two years around it—we see that the official tally of oil imports fell far below this threshold. This is most likely a reflection of the impact of tax evasion by oil importers that fluctuates with the major political events of the time. For example, changes in recorded imports surrounding the fall of the Aristide government in 2004 have been attributed by some observers to
83 increased imports following the imposition of an aid embargo, and by organized resistance from importers who were being compelled to pay taxes. Figure 41: Reported Oil Imports and Time Line for Changing Governments 300,000 150,000 0 2001 Aid embargo begins 2004 Aristide falls 2005 - 2006 Interim government, under UN 2007 - 2010 Preval government, under continued UN presence Source AuthorSource: DGI In summary, important points that can be drawn from what we know about the importers and distributors are that, At least some and perhaps most of the highest tier importers pay little to no taxes (as suggested by the data and according to informants interviewed during the course of the present research), so it is almost impossible to compete with them ( i.e. their profit margins are less than the taxes that a legitimate importer would pay). Corruption at the customs houses means that even if they did pay taxes, other importers face significant and often inscrutable and unpredictable obstacles. Some elite local processors and packagers may not conform to international standards or laws and instead use inferior products, mislabel, pirate internationally copyrighted packaging, and make false claims regarding nutritional content. They also understand local culture and values meaning they can do all this in such a way as to take maximum advantage in advertising and managing consumer taste and packaging preferences Summing up these factors, the owner of one of the largest importing agencies in Haiti explained to the consultant, in private, that “these guys could not survive in a competitive market.” The point being that a distributor who tried to conform to international and Haitian laws and standards would be driven out of business by rivals who evaded taxes and otherwise gamed the system. The primary conclusion that flows from the situation described here is that any social enterprise hoping to reach the popular market with RUTFs may arguably have to work within the existing system, and hence with established distributors.
Page 1 and 2: RESEARCH REPORT part II of 2 parts
Page 3 and 4: Contents 9. The Entrance of Importe
Page 5 and 6: Figure 37: Bongu Brand and Bonlé/A
Page 7 and 8: 71 Entrance of Snack Foods Manufact
Page 9 and 10: 73 Consumers themselves explain why
Page 11 and 12: 75 Figure 30: Some of the Foods tha
Page 13 and 14: 77 It gets worse, while Carnation a
Page 15 and 16: 79 None of this is to say that Bong
Page 17: 81 Government vs. Merchant Elite: W
Page 21 and 22: HG per mammit 85 in the dry Departm
Page 23: 87 Figure 43: Peanut Marketing Chai
Page 26 and 27: 89 None of this is to say that only
Page 28 and 29: 91 Figure 47: Opinion on Which Sex
Page 30 and 31: 93 Figure 52: Time of Day that Resp
Page 32 and 33: 95 Distributors Profit Margins In T
Page 34 and 35: 97 Market Size To arrive at estimat
Page 37 and 38: 99 Distributors and Credit All dist
Page 39 and 40: 101 most fortified foods category,
Page 41 and 42: Figure 62: Dueling Economies 103
Page 43 and 44: 105 Annex 1: Contacts Table A1-1 Go
Page 45 and 46: 107 Table A1-4: Focus Group Partici
Page 47 and 48: Table A1-4: Focus Group Participant
Page 49 and 50: 111 Staff and Survey Structure Surv
Page 51 and 52: 113 Annex 3: Most Nutritional Foods
Page 53 and 54: 115 sauce. Ginger goes with sw
Page 55 and 56: 117 Table A3-4: Rank of Mentioned F
Page 57 and 58: 119 Table A3-6: Total of all Foods
Page 59 and 60: Table A3-8: Women General Item Freq
Page 61 and 62: Table A3-10: Children Item Frequenc
Page 63: 125 ANNEX 4: Cultural Consensus Plo
Page 66 and 67: 127 Secondary Meals When asked most
Page 68 and 69:
129 Food Combination Rules for Seco
Page 70 and 71:
131 Anything Malta is fortifying an
Page 72 and 73:
133 Annex 6: Cost and Profit Analys
Page 74 and 75:
135 Annex 7: Boutik Survey For the
Page 76 and 77:
137 Table A7-5: Summary of Boutik S
Page 79 and 80:
Percentage (%) 139 Annex 8: Port-au
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141 Cookies and cheese puffs also r
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143 Table A8-9: Top fortified foods
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Percentage (%) 145 100% Figure A8-3
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147 Figure A8-5: Restocking frequen
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149 Table A8-17: Most Common Foods
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151 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% Figure A
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153 Annex 11: RUFTs Nutrition and C
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130 Annex 13: Super Market Data: Im
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132 Annex 14: Most Popular Snack Br
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134 Table A14-5: Popular Snacks, Pr
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136 Table A15-4 summarizes Consumer
Page 106 and 107:
138 Ministère de l'Économie et de
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140 a. pierres précieuses et méta
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142 Par la suite, la SGS transmettr
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144 16. Chaque convention d'achat c
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146 h. que le vendeur est avisé qu
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148 Consumer Taste Test Questionnai
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And you, do you think that could re
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10_Grade 11_Grade 12th_Grade 13th_G
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yes no Who most frequently eats it?
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Does anyone in your house currently
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158 Rice* Corn* imported same local
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160 Boutik (neighborhood store) Que
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GPS coordinates can only be collect
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yes no do you give credit to you cl
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166 WORKS CITED Alvarez and Murray,
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168 Katherine Harmon Courage | July
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170 USDA 2005 Dietary Guidelines fo
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