Originally posted by Metropolis Books on October 4, 2013
Off the coast of Port-au-Prince, La Gonâve, Haiti, is the seventh largest island in the Caribbean. The population is estimated to be somewhere between 115,000 and 125,000–a number which fluctuates with attrition since the earthquake in 2010. Life on the remote western end is particularly harsh, as there are no inland water sources. The surface geology in this area is a permeable coral rock which breaks through every few feet, channeling precipitation through invisible caves and fissures to the ocean, where it is wasted and lost, and rendering this region of Haiti perpetually destitute. It is a bleak place overlooked by NGOs because drilling for water here is so risky, expensive and almost universally unsuccessful. Donors don’t readily pay for dry holes.
The plains near La Palmiste during the rainy season
Haiti is considered the most water-poor nation on earth, and La Gonâve has perhaps the most tenuous access in the country. Tens of thousands of residents on the western end survive by saving rain water and otherwise walking ten kilometers or more every few days to collect brackish water from springs near the coast. Families drink this water even though the dissolved solids are several times the international standard, and often compromised by biological contaminants. Here, poor quality water causes hypertension and disease, killing early. Mortality rates in La Gonâve hover closer to the mid to upper forties in years of age, as opposed to the mid-fifties, as in most of Haiti.
Our team had come to prepare a hydrogeological survey for an intrepid NGO which was hoping to drill for water there. Our data and hydrogeologic observations were meant to identify drill sites with reduced risk; however, with virtually no pre-existing information upon which to base our exploration, we were obliged to assemble all of our hydrogeologic information from scratch.
Geophysics field investigation on west end of LaGonâve
Despite these conditions, we were surprised and disquieted when an old, weathered woman in broken shoes approached our truck and pleaded with us in Créole to take her 15 year old daughter. The young girl regarded us without embarrassment or fear. Surely she had heard the offer and understood the underlying suggestion. Perhaps she even agreed with her mother, who argued that escape was worth any cost, that anything would be better than the life this girl had been born into.
Afterwards, our team returned to our work, sobered by the exchange. After years of working in Haiti to provide hydrogeologic mapping, geophysics and water supply design, we had thought we understood this country and the scope of its urgencies. However, this terrible encounter—which ultimately had so much to do with access to water—was all too emblematic.
Water prospecting north of Gonaives using resistivity geophysics
Water-related disease and unrelenting scarcity—throughout the country—sap the population. Sickness strikes across age and gender. For example, since 2010, Cholera has killed more than 8,000 people and sickened nearly 700,000—almost ten percent of the population. In some regions, daily water collection prevents people from participating in anything but the most rudimentary activities, ruling out school for many Haitian children.
Children returning with daily water supply after climbing a 300M hill near Jean Rabel
But water scarcity goes beyond the hours wasted, and even beyond disease and death, tearing at the fabric of communities in more subtle ways. The heavy demands of meeting daily needs and the inability to predict future conditions for even just a couple of days makes it nearly impossible for communities to focus on collective water planning or developing community water cooperatives; it is impossible to calculate how many potential community initiatives go unexplored because of the exigencies of water.
Water scarcity also severely inhibits investment in agricultural advances and manufacturing. In rural Haiti the main economic activities are generally subsistence farming, small marketplace trade and NGO-based services. International development aims to advance rural economies by developing employment options and contributing to civil society. However, without water, these objectives cannot be met: every operation that supports local populations requires water.
Collecting water NW Haiti
And the absence of water, unlike many of Haiti’s other problems, cannot be overcome by governmental action, education, or engineering. Without a readily known source of water, local investments quickly disappear because structural water shortages generally cannot be resolved affordably: advanced and energy-intensive technologies like desalination are rarely financially and operationally feasible in a developing nation.
Even rumors that water may not be available can stall investment. Projects with development budgets in the millions are prematurely aborted because a positive assessment from initial tests cannot be guaranteed in advance. Though planned commercial and large-scale agricultural operations would certainly fail if water were not available, only a modest initial investment is necessary to assess whether or not water is present. Unfortunately, large and worthy projects (whether public or private) are routinely stymied by the risk.
And yet, in many parts of the country, water is abundant. Haiti is a beautiful Caribbean island blessed with many natural riches. The scenery is often spectacular, the oceanfront inspiring, and certain tropical fruits like mangos and coconuts thrive uncultivated. The land can support valuable crops like coffee, bananas, sugar cane, pumpkins, avocado and a wide range of spices. What is scarce is universal access to water prior to contamination or absorption into the sea. In many spots, abundant water resources occur in the subsurface, or flow from the rock face and stream beds. Haiti’s water poverty is not so much the lack of water itself, but the lack of sustainable access and management. For example, even when working wells are installed in a community, there are seldom good systems in place to repair them when they break down. Some estimates suggest that 40% of new wells break within the first year, and upwards of 30% are left in disrepair. Over time, the pumps disappear and children fill the wells with rocks. These investments are lost forever.
Waterfall originating from a spring near Hinche
The fact is that the appalling water conditions in Haiti are wholly and unnecessary.
The good news is that Haiti is now attempting to develop its water resources and learning to manage them. Haiti’s National Directorate for Water Supply and Sanitation (DINEPA) is working to develop the national organization and infrastructure that includes multi-lateral organizations, NGOs, and private companies.
First discharge (1,300 gpm) from a rehabilitated irrigation well Gonaives plain
A lot has to happen for these initiatives to succeed. And to be sure, there will be reversals. First and foremost, for Haiti’s water resources to be developed and managed well, we must assemble and maintain an extensive knowledge base of past and current hydrogeologic and water data from across the country. Haiti has almost no organized body of data or canon of research on which to base further studies or conduct water development work. The only authoritative text on the geology and hydrogeology of Haiti is nearly 100 years old. Haiti may be blessed with abundant groundwater resources, but they remain difficult to find, poorly understood, unprotected, and often tragically unavailable to the local populace because the information is simply not there.
Currently almost all water development in Haiti starts out with only the most basic bits of information, or relies on data developed specifically for a particular project. When new data is generated, it is rarely shared with the next investigator. Information on the hundreds of investigations and tens of thousands of drilled wells is worth tens of millions of dollars but it remains unavailable, incomplete, hidden in filing cabinets or on bookshelves, buried in mountains of irrelevant information, or otherwise lost.
Author taking geologic measurements on a limestone outcrop, Northern Haiti
Without a means to assemble this information and retain it, Haiti cannot develop water supplies efficiently, and areas of greatest need and complexity, like LaGonâve, will continue to be passed over because the risk and expense are too great.
The creation of a comprehensive database or atlas of Haiti’s water resources would be a monumental step forward in promoting civil society. It would serve as a fundamental building block for local and national governmental regulations and become an essential tool for water committees, planners, engineers/scientists, drillers, hospitals, schools, manufacturers, agricultural entities, multi-laterals, NGOs, emergency relief teams and researchers.
Discharge from a large capacity well near Gonaives
Haiti is developing quickly. Infrastructure such as roads and power are transforming the country. And with development comes risks to the water resources. A Haiti water atlas would promote development by reducing the financial risk of searching for water; it would promote planning, management and regulation to prevent damage to water supplies; and finally, an atlas would render the lives of more than 8 million people more independent and self-sufficient for decades to come.
Stuart Dykstra is Senior Vice President and Principal Hydrogeologist at V3, a civil engineering, science and construction firm based in Chicago. He leads the company’s Water, Environment & Natural Resources section and is Senior Project Manager for complex, multi-disciplinary projects in both the public and private sector. Projects include groundwater, water supply, wetlands, fluvial geomorphology, flood control and mining reclamation. Since 2006 he has been developing V3’s Haiti operations and expanding V3’s international water supply services in developing nations around the world. He has worked on projects in Haiti, Africa and Peru. Recently, he co-founded Water Technologies International, an LLC which develops remote monitors for water supplies in developing nations. In 2009, Dykstra received the American Council of Engineering Companies (ACEC) Honor Award for a Groundwater Development Project in Haiti.