Promoting Change in Haiti

While most of us were either holed up at home recovering from days spent with family or out bargain hunting on Black Friday, 83-year-old Sarah Hackett was on her way back to Haiti where she's been helping locals help themselves for the past 16 years, reports Boston.com in a lovely feature story on Hackett's efforts.

Ever since she retired in 1993, Hackett has spent about half of every year in a part of the Caribbean most of us wouldn't dream of visiting. But Hackett's dreams have never involved lounging on a beach, sipping pina coladas. Since she was a teenager, she's wanted to help the disadvantaged and that's just want she's done in Haiti.

The non-profit she founded, Haiti Projects Inc., is an internationally-renowned and award-winning organization that has helped hundreds of Haitians build better lives. It was one of three winners last month of the annual Espíritu Award from the Isabel Allende Foundation. The scope of the work carried about by the non-profit is awe-inspiring.

Hackett admits that it wasn't easy adjusting to life in Haiti when she set out on her first volunteer mission with the St. Boniface Haiti Foundation. The former nurse was in charge of a bare-bones two-room clinic in Fond des Blancs, high in the remote mountains about 75 miles west of the capital, Port au Prince.

"It was a trial by fire," Hackett told Boston.com. "I struggled with the language, and struggled with the diseases. Until then, I’d only just read about malaria, typhoid, tuberculosis, parasites. I muddled through."

But she quickly identified the connection between disease and the extreme poverty of the people and became determined to help the villagers find a sustainable way to make a living. She returned the following year on her own and helped create a grassroots organization that provided small loans to farmers, supported in part by funding from the United States. Now Fond des Blancs is known for its goat meat. The project has been self-sustaining ever since its inception and now has 850 members.

Hackett also founded a family planning clinic, which now serves 750 women with mobile branches in several villages. She then helped the women create an artisans' sewing cooperative that exports garments to the US and Europe, largely through Internet store. With sales reaching 80,000 last year, the cooperative now provides a steady income for 70 women.

"I never thought she would last this long in Haiti," Dr. Wilfrid Cadet, who runs the St. Boniface Hospital told Boston.com. "To live in this rural part of Haiti you must have a mental toughness, as well as the strong desire to help others in need, and she has both."

Hackett is working to make the clinic and sewing cooperatives self-sustaining as well, with donations from US donors. We have no doubt she will achieve her goal. For more information or to help, check out Haiti Projects.

Photo courtesy of treesftf via Flickr.