Clinton Legacy: "Restoring Slavery" at $300m Haitian Industrial Complex
Re-imagining the "Taiwan of the Caribbean," again
The Clintons are in Haiti to inaugurate the new $300 million industrial facility touted as "transformative" for the quake-ravaged country, but many wonder if this is simply the next round of imperialism in a country that has been plagued (literally) by outside intervention for too long.
The Caracol Industrial Park, which is hailed as "the centerpiece of the U.S. effort to help the country recover from the 2010 earthquake," according to Trenton Daniel for the Associated Press, is slated to be built on a remote 617-acre site of farmland, mangroves and coral reefs in the northern part of the country.
Critics of the project believe that the industrial park does little more than replicate failed efforts from the past and will benefit outsiders more than Haitians. Writing for Haiti Liberte, Mona Peralte notes, (translated) "this park is a direct illustration of the role of imperialism in the country namely for exploit [if it] come cheaply, if not restore slavery."
Alex Dupuy, a Haiti-born sociologist at Wesleyan University, adds, "this is not a strategy that is meant to provide Haiti with any measure of sustainable development [...] The only reason those industries come to Haiti is because the country has the lowest wages in the region."
Workers are already protesting the wages offered by the park's anchor tenant, the South Korean apparel company and Walmart supplier, Sae-A Trading Co. Ltd. Etant Dupain writing on the Let Haiti Live website, notes:
Before the official inauguration, several thousand employees have been working in the Caracol park for the last three months at a wage of 150 gourdes ($3.75 US) a day. Since October 1st, the new minimum wage law has gone into effect, with the government setting the minimum at 300 gourdes a day. Despite this, the managers of the factory operating at Caracol aren't respecting the new official minimum wage.
Sae-A's Haiti representative, Daniel Cho, told AP that the employees "will be paid almost $5 for eight hours of work."
In an effort to attract other tenants to the park, the project's architects are offering duty-free status and a 15-year tax holiday. Dupuy says that because of these tax breaks, "outside investors will have more to gain than Haitians," from this project.
The Clintons and their celebrity supporters (Sean Penn, Ben Stiller, fashion designer Donna Karan and British business magnate Richard Branson were all in tow) were in Caracol on Monday to celebrate the opening. Government officials have been lauding the Caracol project as panacea for Haiti's debilitating economic woes. "We had learned that supporting long-term prosperity in Haiti meant more than providing aid," Secretary Clinton told a roomful of investors. "So we shifted our assistance to investments to address some of the biggest challenges facing this country: creating jobs and sustainable economic growth."
Backers of the complex estimate that the park has the potential to generate up to 65,000 total jobs; Sae-A Korea, who already employs 400 people, agreed to create 20,000 permanent jobs within six years and build 5,000 employee houses on site.
The project--which was in the works before the earthquake--became a top priority for the Obama administration after the disaster. Washington has since invested $124 million in the project, making it the U.S.'s biggest single investment in the aftermath of the quake. According to the Associated Press, "it is certain to shape the legacy of the Clintons."
For many local Haitians, there are flashbacks to the baseball factories built in the 1970s and 1980s under the regime of Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier. AP writer Daniel notes:
Those jobs prompted thousands of farmers to leave their fields for the capital, and agricultural areas suffered from neglect. Shantytowns like Cite Soleil emerged to house the new workers. The factories got tax breaks but there was no income to offset Duvalier's alleged plundering of state coffers. Haiti was supposed to become the "Taiwan of the Caribbean" but instead suffered through economic collapse brought on by political instability.
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
The Clintons are in Haiti to inaugurate the new $300 million industrial facility touted as "transformative" for the quake-ravaged country, but many wonder if this is simply the next round of imperialism in a country that has been plagued (literally) by outside intervention for too long.
The Caracol Industrial Park, which is hailed as "the centerpiece of the U.S. effort to help the country recover from the 2010 earthquake," according to Trenton Daniel for the Associated Press, is slated to be built on a remote 617-acre site of farmland, mangroves and coral reefs in the northern part of the country.
Critics of the project believe that the industrial park does little more than replicate failed efforts from the past and will benefit outsiders more than Haitians. Writing for Haiti Liberte, Mona Peralte notes, (translated) "this park is a direct illustration of the role of imperialism in the country namely for exploit [if it] come cheaply, if not restore slavery."
Alex Dupuy, a Haiti-born sociologist at Wesleyan University, adds, "this is not a strategy that is meant to provide Haiti with any measure of sustainable development [...] The only reason those industries come to Haiti is because the country has the lowest wages in the region."
Workers are already protesting the wages offered by the park's anchor tenant, the South Korean apparel company and Walmart supplier, Sae-A Trading Co. Ltd. Etant Dupain writing on the Let Haiti Live website, notes:
Before the official inauguration, several thousand employees have been working in the Caracol park for the last three months at a wage of 150 gourdes ($3.75 US) a day. Since October 1st, the new minimum wage law has gone into effect, with the government setting the minimum at 300 gourdes a day. Despite this, the managers of the factory operating at Caracol aren't respecting the new official minimum wage.
Sae-A's Haiti representative, Daniel Cho, told AP that the employees "will be paid almost $5 for eight hours of work."
In an effort to attract other tenants to the park, the project's architects are offering duty-free status and a 15-year tax holiday. Dupuy says that because of these tax breaks, "outside investors will have more to gain than Haitians," from this project.
The Clintons and their celebrity supporters (Sean Penn, Ben Stiller, fashion designer Donna Karan and British business magnate Richard Branson were all in tow) were in Caracol on Monday to celebrate the opening. Government officials have been lauding the Caracol project as panacea for Haiti's debilitating economic woes. "We had learned that supporting long-term prosperity in Haiti meant more than providing aid," Secretary Clinton told a roomful of investors. "So we shifted our assistance to investments to address some of the biggest challenges facing this country: creating jobs and sustainable economic growth."
Backers of the complex estimate that the park has the potential to generate up to 65,000 total jobs; Sae-A Korea, who already employs 400 people, agreed to create 20,000 permanent jobs within six years and build 5,000 employee houses on site.
The project--which was in the works before the earthquake--became a top priority for the Obama administration after the disaster. Washington has since invested $124 million in the project, making it the U.S.'s biggest single investment in the aftermath of the quake. According to the Associated Press, "it is certain to shape the legacy of the Clintons."
For many local Haitians, there are flashbacks to the baseball factories built in the 1970s and 1980s under the regime of Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier. AP writer Daniel notes:
Those jobs prompted thousands of farmers to leave their fields for the capital, and agricultural areas suffered from neglect. Shantytowns like Cite Soleil emerged to house the new workers. The factories got tax breaks but there was no income to offset Duvalier's alleged plundering of state coffers. Haiti was supposed to become the "Taiwan of the Caribbean" but instead suffered through economic collapse brought on by political instability.
The Clintons are in Haiti to inaugurate the new $300 million industrial facility touted as "transformative" for the quake-ravaged country, but many wonder if this is simply the next round of imperialism in a country that has been plagued (literally) by outside intervention for too long.
The Caracol Industrial Park, which is hailed as "the centerpiece of the U.S. effort to help the country recover from the 2010 earthquake," according to Trenton Daniel for the Associated Press, is slated to be built on a remote 617-acre site of farmland, mangroves and coral reefs in the northern part of the country.
Critics of the project believe that the industrial park does little more than replicate failed efforts from the past and will benefit outsiders more than Haitians. Writing for Haiti Liberte, Mona Peralte notes, (translated) "this park is a direct illustration of the role of imperialism in the country namely for exploit [if it] come cheaply, if not restore slavery."
Alex Dupuy, a Haiti-born sociologist at Wesleyan University, adds, "this is not a strategy that is meant to provide Haiti with any measure of sustainable development [...] The only reason those industries come to Haiti is because the country has the lowest wages in the region."
Workers are already protesting the wages offered by the park's anchor tenant, the South Korean apparel company and Walmart supplier, Sae-A Trading Co. Ltd. Etant Dupain writing on the Let Haiti Live website, notes:
Before the official inauguration, several thousand employees have been working in the Caracol park for the last three months at a wage of 150 gourdes ($3.75 US) a day. Since October 1st, the new minimum wage law has gone into effect, with the government setting the minimum at 300 gourdes a day. Despite this, the managers of the factory operating at Caracol aren't respecting the new official minimum wage.
Sae-A's Haiti representative, Daniel Cho, told AP that the employees "will be paid almost $5 for eight hours of work."
In an effort to attract other tenants to the park, the project's architects are offering duty-free status and a 15-year tax holiday. Dupuy says that because of these tax breaks, "outside investors will have more to gain than Haitians," from this project.
The Clintons and their celebrity supporters (Sean Penn, Ben Stiller, fashion designer Donna Karan and British business magnate Richard Branson were all in tow) were in Caracol on Monday to celebrate the opening. Government officials have been lauding the Caracol project as panacea for Haiti's debilitating economic woes. "We had learned that supporting long-term prosperity in Haiti meant more than providing aid," Secretary Clinton told a roomful of investors. "So we shifted our assistance to investments to address some of the biggest challenges facing this country: creating jobs and sustainable economic growth."
Backers of the complex estimate that the park has the potential to generate up to 65,000 total jobs; Sae-A Korea, who already employs 400 people, agreed to create 20,000 permanent jobs within six years and build 5,000 employee houses on site.
The project--which was in the works before the earthquake--became a top priority for the Obama administration after the disaster. Washington has since invested $124 million in the project, making it the U.S.'s biggest single investment in the aftermath of the quake. According to the Associated Press, "it is certain to shape the legacy of the Clintons."
For many local Haitians, there are flashbacks to the baseball factories built in the 1970s and 1980s under the regime of Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier. AP writer Daniel notes:
Those jobs prompted thousands of farmers to leave their fields for the capital, and agricultural areas suffered from neglect. Shantytowns like Cite Soleil emerged to house the new workers. The factories got tax breaks but there was no income to offset Duvalier's alleged plundering of state coffers. Haiti was supposed to become the "Taiwan of the Caribbean" but instead suffered through economic collapse brought on by political instability.