It was a challenging year for our families and team in Haiti, but the darkest moments allowed bright spots to illuminate, revealing the strength in our community that’s a result of your unwavering commitment. Thanks to your investments, our team and community leaders in Haiti worked courageously and selflessly to preserve the progress made by our families and to also expand our services to new families. This is a highlight of our collective achievements. Here’s to another year together.
We worked with 152 families across Menelas and Truitier, and expanded our reach to 7 communities
including Canaan, Tabarre, Centreville, Petionville, and Les Cayes. We're focusing our work on communities of waste collectors and center owners, as these have businesses set up to address the waste crisis.
Stats we're proud of
Direct service provided for 81 families
29 small businesses seeded and launched
Essential needs and emergency support provided for over 1000 collectors and their families
Diverted our 200 millionth plastic bottle from the environment.
School is in Session
Consistent access to education is a key challenge for families in Haiti. While the majority of kids have access to primary school, less than 50% have the funds to access secondary school and only 1% can access college. Thanks to you, 83% of our students advanced in grade level. One of our students was accepted to the top medical school in Haiti that has a 2.5% acceptance rate.
Health is a Human Right
When we first partnered with families in Menelas, due to a lack of medical facilities in the community then, the majority of our families reported that they had not received any medical care in the past. We started to accompany our families to access care then, and this effort enabled us to track trends and set preventative strategies in place. It’s led to the creation of our Foundational Health Workshops to improve knowledge of the human body, instruct on patient advocacy and informed decision making to improve health outcomes.
Achieving Financial Independence
"I entered the organization [WORK] with two things, vision and hope. The vision to see my children’s lives change and the hope to become an accomplished and independent woman where I could inspire many young mothers like me. The visible proof is that I take care of my family with dignity and my business is growing in spite of the difficulties that the country is facing."
Gertha
Business Owner and WORK Family Member
HAITI AND BEYOND
When our organization was founded, we knew that simply creating a model to train and place families into dignified work wouldn’t be enough. With a 60% unemployment rate, we’d also need to create jobs. In partnership with our sister company, we decided to create jobs utilizing waste as an asset as there was not only a waste crisis in Haiti but a growing waste crisis globally.
In Haiti, due to a lack of waste management infrastructure, there’s miles of waste in the environment. Given its geography, they end up floating into the ocean. With a global demand for recycled plastic materials, we began to connect brands like HP and CPI Card Group to Haiti to source recycled materials for their products.
In 2022, our collectors logged their 200,000,000 plastic bottle collected. The income generated has enabled them to provide for their families and to grow their businesses to create jobs for their neighbors. It’s also returned streets and canals to communities, and prevented thousands of pounds of plastic waste from reaching the ocean.
While waste collection has become a focus for jobs, we will continue to invest in small businesses addressing essential infrastructure for our communities to thrive long term - such as the grocery stores, tap tap (transportation), construction, and clean energy.
In 2023, we’re expanding our program to additional communities in Haiti centered around waste collection. We’ll also bring our model to other countries thanks to new funding sources. You’ll hear us talk more about the intersection of social justice and environmental justice, and how we’re graduating more families to financial independence in Menelas, Truitier, while introducing new communities. We can’t wait.
Bonswa from Haiti
A BIG "hello" from our team members in Haiti who manage, lead and facilitate all programming on the ground.
