Essay on Haiti Cultural Awareness

Haiti is a sovereign Caribbean country that is located on Hispaniola in the archipelago in the Caribbean Sea. The Caribbean Sea where Haiti is located also includes other smaller islands like Vache, Tortue, Grande Caye, and Gonave. Haitis capital is known as Port-au-Prince. The population here is almost fully comprised of the descendants of African slaves, and it gained its independence from the US (NgCheong-Lum, Jermyn, & Nevins, 2016).

Urban and suburban terrain

Haiti is beset with serious problems and severe poverty due to the political, social and economic instabilities they face, and due to natural calamities, they have experienced. The terrain of Haiti varies so much with over three-quarters of territory over 210 meters, and it is mostly rough and mountainous. The fertile valleys are interspersed in between the mountainous ranges making a vast contrasting are between the highlands in that territory. The lowest point of elevation in the country is the sea level while the highest is Pic, la Selle. The eastern and central region of this island is a massive elevated plateau. The northern side has the Massif du Nord and the northern plain. Massif du Nord starts at the eastern border of Haiti extending to the northern peninsula. In the southwest of that plateau are the Montagnes Noires and its North West join with the Massif du Nord (Geo-Congress et al.., 2013). The south region has the mountainous southern peninsula and Plaine du Cul-de-Sac a depression harboring a saline lake and the countys biggest Lake Baoruco.

Key infrastructure

The infrastructure in Haiti was mostly destroyed during the 2010 earthquake. Later the Haiti government with the United States agency for international development focused on upgrading the infrastructure in the neighborhood and increasing housing finances. They then constructed more than 900 containing modern sanitation, water, and electricity although Haiti in the western hemisphere is the country with the lowest rate to access the sanitation and water infrastructure (Gelting, Bliss, Patrick, Lockhart, & Handzel, 2013).

The infrastructure in Haiti is poorly maintained and primitive due to environmental damage and under investments for so long. For instance, most roads that link most large towns to Port-au-Prince are impassable using ordinary vehicles. There is no railway line except one at an ex-sugar plantation and very few modern airports one in Port-au-Prince and another in Cap-Haitien. Television and telephone are somehow non-existent in the countryside, and the internet connections and phones are only preserved for the wealthy people who are the minority. The hydroelectric power system has been silted by due to soil erosion that has resulted from deforestation (NgCheong-Lum, Jermyn, & Nevins, 2016). The infrastructure is also crumbling making Haiti unfit for setting up companies for the foreign manufacturers. The country has no pipelines too.

Lines of communication

The telecommunication of Haiti is one of the least developed in the Caribbean and Latin America. Despite being so poor, Haiti has tied to increase their mobile coverage rate making it the driving force in the Caribbean but the use of radio has remained to be the primary source of information for Haitians. However, they still use landlines, and in some years back, they had 50,000 active main lines making it 163rd in the whole world. When it comes to internet lines, they have two main internet service providers that H@inet and Access Haiti who are under Haitian telecommunication authority CONATEL. Access Haiti is the leading company in Haiti with so many solutions for internet connectivity (Bell, 2016). However, Haitis terrain has affected the communication lines especially after the earthquake, which led to damage of most of their communication lines.

Past significant military conflicts

In the Haitian history, there are several military conflicts, which are; Haitian annexation in Spanish Haiti that occurred from 1821-1822 where Haiti settles and annexes Spanish Haiti a newly independent state. Also, in 1844 - 1849 when Dominicans waged war for independence that was successful from Haiti. The Haiti-Dominican wars between 1849 and 1856 under emperor Faustin I and the Haitian empire attacked the Dominican island side, but they lost every time. In 1861, there was also a conflict after re-establishment of the colonial control on the Dominicans and Haiti sent their forces to help Dominicans fight the Spanish. The threats of Spanish forced the end of Haiti intervention. The occupation of US in Haiti in 1915-1935 and during this time the rebellions were two that is Caco rebellions or caco wars where there was also a significant conflict of Haitian military. Occupation of the US in Haiti in 1994-1995 when the forces from America invaded Haiti to overthrow the military dictatorship that had been there since 1991 during the Haitian coup detat which toppled the president-elect Jean Bertrand (Stoyan, Niedzwiecki, Morgan, Hartlyn, & Espinal, 2016). The American troops and the US left Haiti in the year 2000. Lastly is the FLRN insurgency that was from 2001-2004. There was a conflict that culminated in 2004 in a coup, and the president then lost his power, flew out of America, and later made claims that Americans had kidnapped him.

Weather analysis

The climate of Haiti is tropical although it varies due to the difference in altitudes of different areas. Port-au-Prince has a temperature range of between 23 0C to 310C in January while in July it ranges from 25 0C to 35 0C. The pattern of rainfall in Haiti varies from the lowlands to the highlands. Some lowlands, eastern and northern slopes of mountains in Haiti experience heavy rainfall. The rainy seasons are two from April to June and in between October to November. The dry season in this country occurs in November up to January (Redclift, Grasso, & Redclift, 2013). The average rainfall they receive annually is 1370 mm. The country may sometimes experience floods or drought due to deforestation effects. The wind that is experienced in Haiti depends on the local topography, and the direction and speed of the wind vary widely than the averages in each hour. The hourly average of the speed of the wind in Port-au-Prince in the year experiences mild seasonal variations. During windier times the speed is 5.7 miles per hour while the calmer times of the year the speed is 4.8 miles per hour. The perceived humidity of Port-au-Prince is extremely seasonal in variation. Comfort levels during the muggier period of the year are miserable, oppressive or muggy. Since Port-au-Prince is near a water body, they still experience some average water temperature variations. Port-au-Prince has a variation in the year of the length of the day (Redclift, Grasso, & Redclift, 2013). The cloudiness of Port-au-Prince also varies in different times of the year from clear, partly cloudy or overcast.

Civil considerations

First, the Haiti law gives protection to the inventions, patent rights and industrial designs like trademarks, models, business names and manufacturers mark. Those involved in infringement, unfair competition, and fraud are penalized. Second, are real property interests that are affected by lack of a complete civil registry. Legitimate titles for properties have a problem of being nonexistent or may be conflicting with another of similar property (NgCheong-Lum, Jermyn, & Nevins, 2016). Lastly, consideration was after the Haiti disaster of an earthquake where the collaboration of the military and the civilian medical proverbs helped achieve order after that chaos.

References

Bell, B. (2016). Fault lines: Views across Haiti's divide.

Gelting, R., Bliss, K., Patrick, M., Lockhart, G., & Handzel, T. (2013). Water, sanitation and hygiene in Haiti: past, present, and future. The American journal of tropical medicine and hygiene, 89(4), 665-670.Geo-Congress, In Meehan, C. L., In Pradel, D., In Pando, M. A., In Labuz, J. F., & American Society of Civil Engineers. (2013). GeoCongress 2013: Stability and performance of slopes and embankments III : proceedings of the 2013 Congress, March 3-7, 2013, San Diego, California.

NgCheong-Lum, R., Jermyn, L., & Nevins, D. (2016). Haiti.

Redclift, M. R., Grasso, M., & Redclift, M. R. (2013). Handbook on Climate Change and Human Security. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing.Stoyan, A. T., Niedzwiecki, S., Morgan, J., Hartlyn, J., & Espinal, R. (2016). Trust in government institutions: The effects of performance and participation in the Dominican Republic and Haiti. International Political Science Review, 37(1), 18-35.