This Tuesday at 7PM: Eyewitness Haiti Educational Forum

Below is an article about the US program that attempted to eradicate the indigenous Creole pig from Haiti during the eighties. The purported reason was an outbreak of African Swine Fever that officials claimed would travel to the US..

After the indigenous Creole pigs were nearly systematically brought to extinction, the replacement Iowa domesticated pigs were introduced, they required a great deal more resources than the indigenous pigs. A similar situation occurred in the US with the extermination of the bison and replacement by domestic cattle that require extra food crops like alfalfa and corn for survival and faster growth..

When people in Haiti have even the slightest bit of independence form colonial powers like US or France, it seems to frighten the elite of those countries. The US sponsored slaughter of the indigenous Creole pig represents the campaign to remove any possible chance of the Haitian people living as a free republic independent from their former colonial slavemasters..

Combine this with the clearcutting of the Haitian forests circa WW2 to grow rubber trees for tires. The rubber tree plantations were not able to hold the topsoil on Haiti's steep slopes and the result was massive erosion and desertification of the mountainsides. While US propaganda enjoys the role of a just victory against the Nazi regime in Germany (even though elites like Prescott Bush, Rockefeller, Ford, etc. funded Hilter's Nazi party long before the war), the price of WW2 effected the Haitian population by removing their protective forests..

"Some American companies such as the United Fruit and Alantic Fruit Company would have a least harmful impact on the Haitian environment in areas near Port-de-Paix, where they created large plantations of bananas. The Haitian Pine-Aple company had large plantations of pine apples near Cap Haitien. A large section of the Haitian forest throughout the countryside would be lost during clearing for plantation of sisal and rubber trees, thus marking the beginning of Haiti's environmental problem in the arena of visible deforestation of trees. Part of the peasants population began to suffer from malnutrition "No land, No food". Most of them no longer had their small farm to cultivate and harvest to feed themselves, or sell or make exchange to survive, as the founder of the Haitian nation, Dessalines had planned and envisioned during his short live agrarian reform. In search of a better economic life, poor Haitians started their mass exodus and began to migrate legally and illegally to other neighboring islands of the Caribbean, such as Cuba and the Dominican Republic, etc."

http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/9972/haitipai.htm



Imperialism and colonialism continue to plague the people of Haiti today, compounded by the ecological devastation of decades past..

"Rural Haiti has been especially devastated. Recent flooding and mudslides have resulted in the deaths of almost 2,000 people in Haiti and the Dominican Republic (more on this in a moment). These deaths are in addition to the massive numbers killed by the rebels. Those who haven't been killed are struggling with the rising price of goods. Some families are forced to remain hungry while spending all of their money on food for their pigs. Over 80% of rural households own pigs, which are large investments. Typically a pig is used as a rainy day fund. In fact, the same word is used for "pig" and "bank." They are sold to help pay for a special occasion or an emergency. They also play an important role in keeping the soil fertile. Their economic importance has put families in a situation where they are forced to feed their pigs before they can even think about feeding their children.

Things might be different had it not been for the fact that international agencies ordered the mass extermination of indigenous Creole pigs in 1982. The U.S. feared that an alleged outbreak of African Swine Fever among Haitian pigs would spread to other countries. Two years after the Creole pigs were nearly eliminated, they were replaced by new pigs from Iowa. The new pigs required food, shelter, and clean water (unavailable to most people in Haiti). The peasants dubbed them "four-footed princes." The Creole pigs were adapted to Haiti's climate and conditions and could eat almost anything. The failure of the repopulation program has resulted in as much as $600 million in losses and a massive decapitalization of the peasant economy, as well as further deterioration of soil quality."

above from;

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=55&ItemID=5609


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creole_Pig



"Creole Pig Re-Population Project
Project Partner: Grassroots International
Beneficiaries: 26,000 direct, 150,000 indirect
Re-introducing the Creole pig, once a vital source of food as well as a means of maintaining capital for times of great need, in Haiti. Groups of peasants receive pigs, and then breed them and pass on new pigs in a continuing chain to other groups."

above from;

http://www.foodforall.org/07_international_03.html

These ecological topics may be of interest to the discussion this evening..