...Spring Break 2013: A Journey of Riches I embarked to Haiti in Spring 2013 because I love to travel. I imagined this trip to be a fun time away from the AUC, but little did I know was that this little country on half of an island would forever change how I viewed the world. I must say, I was not well versed on Haiti prior to the trip. I can begrudgingly confess that my perception of Haiti was a product of the American media. I believed what my country had told me: things were bad, really bad and getting worse. More than seeing this seemingly hopeless poverty stricken country, I was able to dive head first into the culture and history of what it means to call yourself a Haitian. My preconceived notion of poverty could not compete with the sights awaiting me in various areas of Haiti. If nothing else, Haiti, moreover Haitians taught me to be grateful for all that I had been blessed with in America. Especially the little things I would generally take for granted like an endless hot water shower, adequate shelter, and consistent electricity. It was difficult for me to put myself in my Haitian counterparts shoes. A 21-year-old girl living in a poverty stricken country that had survived an earthquake only to be hit by a hurricane two years later. The Haitians are a tenacious people, which was eloquently and majestically illustrated to me through our crash course in Haitian history. It was also evident by the “extreme” measures that their youth would go to in order to ensure...
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...are Alive and Well The Harvard essay by Gino Del Guercio,” The Secrets of Haiti’s Living Dead” describing, the adventure and exploration of Wade Davis, a Harvard botanist, on the tiny island using scientific ways and cash to prove the existence of zombies, and the formula used within a voodoo subculture. The Haitian people use a secret commission to govern social deviance by using poison to place people in a state of living dead whereby, a funeral actually takes place for the drugged individual including a proper burial. Del Guercio describes, how the graves are then uncovered by the commission and placed with nearby plantation owners to do menial labor for the duration of their lives in an altered state. The Zombies of Haiti serve a societal purpose to keep down crime, and the unusual deviances from the social norms in which, these poor people have developed over 100's of years. In a general comparison to the zombies of Haiti and the zombies in the " New Dawn of the Dead" movie. The zombies of the movies are made for strictly entertainment purposes and are changed to fit a mold of the producer and writer. The zombies are far fetched whereby; zombies suddenly appear and change humans into more zombies. On the other hand Del Guercio reveals, through Wade Davis, a real voodoo culture on the Isle of Haiti in which, zombies are made of everyday inhabitants for crimes against society and places fear in the average...
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...Poverty and Inequality in Haiti Poverty has an effect on people in Haiti in various aspects of everyday life, including housing, nourishment, education, healthcare, infant mortality rates and environment. Haiti has been capped with low levels of living setting, with many Haitians voyaging to urban areas. Level of poverty in Haiti is regarded as among the most severe in the western hemisphere. In Haiti there is striking large gap between rich and poor, and inequality is likely to amplify as the income gap broadens. The poorest 40 % of the population have admittance to less than 6 % of the country’s income, and the richest 2 % of the Haiti people have power over 26 % of national possessions. Haiti’s poorest people depend primarily on self employment and remittances for their income, while poor people who are moderately better off get their income mainly from pay earnings and allowances. The country is prone to hurricanes, flooding and climate related adversities. These climatic tragedies affect agricultural sector resulting to food insecurity that distress the community. The issue of climate change presents decisive challenge for Haiti’s development. People in Haiti living in rural areas have suffered as a result of increasing force on existing resources. Because of the pressure on land for cultivation, worsened by urban contravention on arable flatlands and irrigated land, the agricultural sector consists mainly of small scale farms. Land holdings are less than 1 ha in size. A...
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...Poor countries are poor because they are wasting their resources. As iqbal z quadir suggest, the main cause of the poverty is the country itself. Poor countries face problems such as hunger, low standard of living and trap in the poverty cycle for generations. Sometimes, they blamed the natural disasters they have experienced. However, in my view, all these are just excuses. The causes of such problems are corruption, poor governance and the wrong attitudes of the individual. Therefore, I agree that poor countries have mainly themselves to blame for the problems they face today. Corruption is a major cause of the poverty and it occurs at all levels of the society, from the government to every citizen. Corruption causes people to ignore the rules and regulation in the country as what is useful is bribe. Corruption in government will lead to the government to implement policies which favour the rich and not helping the poor. This will worsen the problem of poverty cycle as rich will become richer and poor can only be poorer. In addition, corruption might means that the citizens will need to spend more money in order to receive goods and services. This will force families to buy lesser food and spend lesser money to increase their material standard of living. Thus leads to the rise of hunger, low standard of living and poverty cycle. Another major factor is poor governance. A government is like the brain of a human body, an indispensable component of the country. It gives the directions...
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...and rising incomes, it is estimated that the demand for food will rise by 70 to 100 percent by 2050. To meet this need, the United Nations estimates that production in developing countries will need to almost double. • In 2010, the U.S. helped launch the Global Agriculture and Food Security Program, an international, multilateral trust fund that has already awarded $658 million to finance country development plans in 18 low-income countries, with 8.2 million beneficiaries. Building Local Capacity, Increasing Productivity, and Improving Markets and Trade • Since 2010, USDA has aligned appropriate programs to Feed the Future plans to support agriculture development in target countries and regions: Ghana, Kenya, East Africa, Bangladesh, Haiti, Guatemala and Central America. USDA supports global food security through in-country capacity building, basic and applied research, and support for improved market information, statistics and analysis. • USDA...
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...Social Psychology in Society On January 12, 2010 the search for survivors from the devastating earthquake in Haiti began. A current estimate suggests that upwards of 200,000 people may have perished, and efforts now turn to the approximately 3 million Haitians affected by the quake. They are in need of everything from medical care to housing, but most importantly food. Despite the outpouring of both monetary and other aid internationally, getting help to those in need has proven difficult [ (Ignarri, 2010) ]. Whenever natural disasters strikes, there follows an outpouring of humanity. We have a deeply evolved psychological need to help people who are suffering, especially when heart-rending images enter our home. The tear-streaked face of an orphaned child or the look of desperation in a father's eyes as he searches through rubble for his family touch our hearts. We are shaped by Darwinian natural selection to be empathetic. Most people never think about the reasons such behaviors have arisen in humans. In fact, there is often such a simplistic view of Darwin's theory that many people argue such generosity toward others, especially strangers, is impossible [ (Cornwell, 2010) ]. The days immediately following the hurricane or quake or other calamity, reporters warn of a generalized “fear” that desperate survivors may turn to violence and looting. Then, sure enough, reporters tell stories of violence and looting. Some are eye witness accounts by credible observers. Most are...
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...New book In 2006–08, food shortages became a global reality, with the prices of commodities spiraling beyond the reach of vast numbers of people. International agencies were caught flatfooted, with the World Food Program warning that its rapidly diminishing food stocks might not be able to deal with the emergency. Owing to surging prices of rice, wheat, and vegetable oils, the food import bills of the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) climbed by 37 percent from 2007 to 2008, from $17.9 million to $24.6 million, after having risen by 30 percent in 2006. By the end of 2008, the United Nations reported, “the annual food import basket in LDCs cost more than three times that of 2000, not because of the increased volume of food imports, but as the result of rising food prices.”1 These tumultuous developments added 75 million people to the ranks of the hungry and drove an estimated 125 million people in developing countries into extreme poverty.2 Alarmed by massive global demand, countries like China and Argentina resorted to imposing taxes or quotas on their rice and wheat exports to avert local shortages. Rice exports were simply banned in Cambodia, Egypt, India, Indonesia, and Viet Nam. South-South solidarity, fragile in the best of times, crumbled, becoming part of the collateral damage of the crisis. Global Crisis, Global Protests For some countries, the food crisis was the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back. Some thirty countries experienced violent popular...
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...people die every day which caused by problems like hunger and lack of medical care. Western countries are defined as the country that located at western hemisphere affairs such as United Kingdom, Europe, Canada, and America (Worldatlas, year unknown). These countries organise various projects to eradicate these issues so that poverty can be solved. Global poverty is defined as a lack of material wealth needed to maintain existence (The Three Dictionary,2011). This essay will seek to argue that western countries are doing enough to fight global poverty. These will be referenced on the three areas of eradicating extreme poverty and hunger, improving the supply of medicine to those in need and providing education to young children. To begin with, western countries are doing enough to fight global poverty because they are eradicating hunger. Western countries provide food and daily needs for the poor through funding or organization like Millennium Development Goals by the United Nations. Around the world more than 2.5 billion of poor live in grinding poverty on less than $2 a day (the UN Works for People and the Planet, 2011). According to the “8 Goals For Africa Campaign”, which is established by the Millennium Development Goals Advocacy Campaign by the UN of South Africa, one of the commitments signed by the UN Millennium Declaration on September 2008 stated that they are willing to commit in abolishing extreme poverty and hunger in South Africa(End Poverty 2015 millennium...
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...Haitian Creole Haitian Creole (HC) is a language that is derived from French and West African. It is one of the two national languages of Haiti; however, it was not recognized as such until 1987 (Etienne, 2005). Prior to 1987, the only national language of Haiti was French even though only about 10-15% of the Haitian population speaks French while 90-95% speak HC. This late acceptance date of HC as a national language is possibly due to the attitudes and feelings towards HC. Etienne (2005) studied the attitudes and feelings towards the two languages. Her research supports that Haitians felt it was a privilege to speak French and, if a person can speak French they have a higher status than a person who cannot. HC is taught in the home...
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...Social services Actions speak louder than words Wherever we live and work around the world, we give back to our communities and reach out to those who need our help. In 2009, Sun Life was proud to contribute more than $2 million to make life a little easier for thousands facing disaster, hunger and economic hardship. Of that amount, more than $1 million was distributed in Canada, made up of corporate donations and matching gifts. These dollar amounts were augmented by thousands of hours of employees and advisors’ volunteer activities. Highlights of their contributions can be found on pages 18 and 19. CAnAdIAn rEd CroSS – dISAStEr rELIEF yWCA toronto – WomEn oF dIStInCtIon AWArdS The Canadian Red Cross is renowned and respected as the first-response agency in disaster relief, at home and abroad. Following a disaster, the Red Cross arrives on the scene, often within hours, and works with governments and other humanitarian organizations to provide survivors with the basics of life: food, clothing, shelter, first aid, emotional support and family reunification. Red Cross services are based on the specific need of the moment and the role it is asked to take in the local disaster response plan. Sun Life has been a financial supporter of the Canadian Red Cross since 1927, and has been proud to contribute to the widespread good it brings wherever it steps in to help. In 2005, we established the Sun Life Financial International Response Fund with the Canadian Red Cross, the first-ever...
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...What is Food Security? Food Security refers to a household's physical and economic access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food that fulfills the dietary needs and food preferences of that household for living an active and healthy life. As per the combined interpretations of The World Health Organisation and The Food and Agriculture Organisation, Food security is defined by the following 4 paradigms: Ensuring Availability Ensuring Access Ensuring Utilization Ensuring Stability Availability is having available sufficient quantities of food on a consistent basis. Food access is having sufficient resources, both economic and physical, to obtain appropriate foods for a nutritious diet. Food use is the appropriate use based on knowledge of basic nutrition and care, as well as adequate water and sanitation. The Food and Agriculture Organisation adds a fourth facet: the stability of the first three dimensions of food security over time. Food Security Act: Food Security is achieved not only by augmenting food supply but also by implementing institutional reforms, social policies, and programmes to improve economic and social access to food and provision of basic services for nutritional absorption. There is considerble diversity in country performance and experiences in terms of the timing, pace and degree of economic and institutional reforms, and multiplicity of approaches and instruments used to increase economic access to food and nutritional...
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...Derliny Louis Sociology 111-04 Mr Thomas Byron January 26 2015 Personal Introduction/Barrier Paper My Name is Derliny Jurine Louis, I am a freshmen at Quinsigamond Community College I’m currently in my second semester. I was Born and raised in Haiti in the capital of Port-au-Prince. I came to the United States at the age of seven years old where I lived in New Jersey until I moved to Worcester Massachusetts October 2013. I live with my mom and younger brother I have a older sister who lives in British Columbia Canada. I’m majoring in Human Services at QCC. My career goal is to help people in life I want to work directly with all people from different aspects of life helping them with the problems they are facing in life. I do not play any sports although I must say I am a big fan of basketball. My favorite team would have to the Miami Heat I feel that they work great as a team and will always be number one in my eyes. I don’t really like to watch television at all because I feel that the shows on TV have changed throughout the years and not so must interesting as shows used to be five years ago. Although when I do watch television I will watch law and order , criminal minds and lifetime movie network. Music is my life I honestly love music. I always tell people that music is my escape from people when I am upset. I always have on my headphones whether I’m walking or at home. I do not have a favorite...
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...Monsanto’s Code of Ethics seemed to elude me for awhile. It wasn’t because they did not have it on their company website, it was because they had multiple pages on their website dedicated to their “Code of Business Conduct”, “Business Conduct” and “Code of Ethics for Chief Executives and Senior Financial Officers”. All said similar things, but it amounted to not much more than fluff, from my perspective, as their actions don't seem to coincide with those ideals. It is exactly what people hope to see when reading any company's code of ethics. Upon researching Monsanto and it's ethical issues, I have come to the conclusion that I do not believe them to be very ethical actors, or at the very least, they know how to operate in gray areas. While they do donate to charities, those donations seem to have motivation beyond altruism. To me, their donating seeds to third world nations is really only an attempt to get in to an untapped market that will eventually rely on them. The reason I believe this is because they have shown through past actions that their main goal is to control the majority of the world's GMO supply whether it is seeds or Prosilac, the hormone used to produce more milk in cows, or any other product they produce. They sued DuPont, a competitor, for trying to create their own seeds that could withstand Roundup (a Monsanto product that has all but completely saturated the marketplace). If DuPont didn't try to engineer seeds that could withstand Roundup, they literally...
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...United States of America 1. US population hit 100 million in 1915, 200 million in 1967, and 300 million in 2006. 2. The United States of America is one of the largest countries in the world based on both population and land area. 3. Even though English is the most commonly spoken language used in the United States and is the language used in government, the country does not have an official language. Mexico 1. Mexico City is the oldest capital city in the Americas 2. Mexico City has the highest elevation and is the oldest city located in North America. It is also one of the largest cities in the entire world. 3. Spanish is the national language of Mexico. Mexico is the most populated Spanish-speaking country in the world. Canada 1. Canada is the world's second largest country area wise. 2. Half of Canada is covered with forests, considering one-tenth of the world's forests are there. 3. Canada has two official languages: English and French. 59% of Canadians use English as their official language. Only 23% use French as their official language and 18% have more than one official language. Colombia 1. Colombia is the third-most populous country in Latin America. 2. Colombia is a free market economy with major commercial and investment ties to the United States of America. 3. Colombia has four major industrial centers--Bogota, Medellin, Cali and Barranquilla. Brazil 1. Brazil is the largest country located in South America...
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...by warfare and economic crises. The economic crisis of the 1980s, coupled with the Contra War, has worsened the greatest social problems Nicaragua has faced in the past few decades, namely unemployment, poverty and starvation. Widespread poverty and unemployment have lead to housing shortages, malnutrition and rising crime and illiteracy. More than half of Nicaraguans live in poverty; the statistics for unemployment and underemployment are just as high. Nicaragua – A Nation in Crisis Nicaragua is a land of lakes and volcanoes. The country also boasts the longest rivers, vast coastal lagoons, and hundreds of miles of sea coast. Although a beautiful country, Nicaragua is the second poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, with Haiti being the first. Nicaragua faces three main social problems: unemployment, poverty, and starvation. Unemployment Nicaragua's unemployment hovers around 70 percent, the highest in Latin America. Because of the uneven distribution of wealth, as well as the economic and political commotions, the poor have even suffered during periods of economic growth. Nicaragua’s economic crisis left the country in terrible straits. After years of hyperinflation, salaries have become nonexistent. Many Nicaraguans are forced to supplement their so-called salaries by working in the black market or as street vendors and taxicab drivers. The economic situation in Nicaragua has been getting better. The country has been following an International...
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