Quixote Center’s work in Haiti prioritizes systemic change. Our theory of change has three aspects:

  • Economic development initiatives that lead to meaningful and sustainable jobs and income for families and communities;
  • Reforestation to preserve Haiti’s environment and protect the soil and watershed;
  • Advocacy to promote US policies that support Haitian democracy and Haitian-led solutions to poverty, gang violence, and migration.

     

Gros Morne and Grepen

Quixote Center partners with the Montfortain Fathers for a variety of projects in the Gros Morne area. Historically we have supported the Jean Marie Vincent Formation Center, which houses a tree nursery, a model instructional garden and multiple classrooms for training small-scale farmers. With our support, the JMV Center also maintains the Tet Mon model forest, a reforestation project that is the only one of its kind in the region. The JMV team holds formation sessions on reforestation and tree maintenance for local leaders, schoolchildren, and agronomy students.

 

Quixote Center also partners with the Montfortain-led LaChandle parish to support displaced people who fled to the Gros Morne area as a result of internal violence or deportations. With our support, the parish has sponsored programs to keep children in school and provide child-safe spaces to prevent gang recruitment. We have also provided cash assistance for the parents so that they can start small businesses and stabilize their income.

Developpement Communautaire Chretien Haitien (DCCH)

DCCH, a member of Caritas, partnered with Quixote Center in 2023 to conduct a needs assessment among rural communities around Les Cayes to identify investment priorities. After consulting with hundreds of community members through interviews and focus groups, together we designed a project that provides targeted investments in agroecological training, animal care, and women empowerment through microloans and small business ventures.  In 2025, we launched the Socio-Economic Recovery Program as a scalable and replicable pilot project working with 100 rural families reaching up to 1000 people. This community-led initiative aims to improve their income and food security while building resilience and eliminating dependence on outside assistance.  DCCH distributes seeds and livestock as loans where recipients return the same quantity of seeds and the first offspring to the program for redistribution. In 2026 we included an additional 100 families. 

Read the final report from the 2025 pilot . 

Updates from the agronomy team in Gros Morne

Fri, 10/30/2020 - 10:59am by Tom

Several years ago a breed of weevil began infesting sweet potato crops in the area around Gros Morne, ruining many harvests. In response, the team at the Jean Marie Vincent Formation Center went to work developing a weevil resistance strain of sweet potatoes, and have been introducing this to farmers. Below are some photos from a project site in Perou, a satellite nursery for sweet potatoes, Aneus (red shirt) and Teligene (white shirt) check on sweet potatoes. 

New Hens in the Hen House

Fri, 10/16/2020 - 9:48pm by Tom

On 11 August, 2020, the hen house celebrated the one-year anniversary of the arrival of the first 1,000 hens. The hen house provides low-cost eggs to community groups for resale in the local market. The Quixote Center helped fund the solar powered water pump for the hen house. The hen house is committed to using feed that is 100% grown locally. This is a goal that is close to being met.

Political violence and U.S. policy in Haiti

Fri, 09/25/2020 - 1:20pm by Tom

 

The notorious paramilitaries of the past, the Tonton Macoute and FRAPH may be gone today, but the people of Haiti are once again under the threat of the presence of armed groups acting with impunity.  The use of armed gangs by political actors in Haiti (and many other places, including the U.S.) to “keep order” is hardly a new phenomenon. However, over the last several years, as protests against the PHTK government have grown, these gangs have been mobilized in what seems a coordinated fashion. They are heavily armed, and have engaged in multiple attacks on communities.

"Toto" Constant is not just Haiti’s problem

Fri, 07/10/2020 - 12:15pm by Tom

On June 23, the United States’ Immigration and Customs Enforcement deported Emmanuel “Toto” Constant to Haiti. Constant was arrested as he arrived in Port-au-Prince, based on a 2000 conviction for the massacre of political opponents at Raboteau, Haiti. In 1994, at the time of the massacre, Constant was head of a paramilitary organization called the Front for the Advancement and Progress of Haiti (FRAPH), which is known to have engaged in widespread human rights violations, including murder, rape, and torture. When U.S.

Haiti and COVID-19

Fri, 03/27/2020 - 6:05pm by Tom

As of Thursday, March 26, Haiti had eight confirmed cases of COVID-19. The Ministry of Health is tracking the location of confirmed and suspected cases and providing other updates . As with everywhere the virus has appeared, the principal advice is social distancing and taking extra steps to ensure that hands remain clean. Handwashing stations have popped up all over - as potable, running water is in short supply in many parts of the country.

Haiti's international crisis

Sat, 02/22/2020 - 10:06am by Tom

The large scale demonstrations and roadblocks that had shut Haiti down for several months last fall are over — for now. Parliament is no longer in session. Absent elections, there are not enough members for a quorum.  As a result, President Moïse is ruling by decree. He shows no signs of resigning, and continues to hold out a process of dialogue with opposition political leaders as a way out of the crisis. Negotiations have taken place, but continue to be stalled on the question of Moïse’s tenure in office.

Haiti: Ten years and a week after

Wed, 01/22/2020 - 2:41pm by Tom

Sunday, January 11 marked the ten-year anniversary of the earthquake in Haiti, centered near Port-au-Prince, that killed 220,000 or more people, and displaced millions. Being a ten year anniversary, there were a number of retrospective political analyses looking at the current crisis through the lens of events in the ten years since the quake.

Celebrating Haiti’s Independence

Fri, 01/03/2020 - 3:59pm by Tom

On January 1, 1804 Haiti became the second independent republic in the western hemisphere, and the first to abolish slavery. Unlike the U.S. war for independence, in Haiti there was a true revolution of social forces. People who had been enslaved in Haiti rose up against the French colonial authority and won their freedom and with it the country’s independence. The only successful rebellion of people enslaved known to history came with the defeat of the military super-power of the time - France under Napoleon Bonaparte.

Haiti: A tale of two meetings

Fri, 12/13/2019 - 2:00pm by Tom

On Tuesday this week, in Port au Prince and in Washington D.C., people gathered to talk about the crisis in Haiti. In one meeting, demands for restitution and accountability rang out from the voices of activists gathered from around the world. In the other, a mixed message of a need for change in the U.S. position, but no mechanism or real direction for how that should happen. In one meeting, a passionate call for justice and a new social order. In the other, political posturing more attuned to partisan differences in the U.S. than the crisis in Haiti. 

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