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rizhi_finКогда деньгами не поможешь.
By Lorne Gunter
Jan. 14 (National Post) -- Of all the words I've read to
describe post-quake Haiti, the most apt is 'dystopian.'
Haiti is not only the poorest nation in the Western
hemisphere, it is also the most wretched and dysfunctional. By
nearly every measure -- stability of civil society, corruption,
GDP, per capita income -- Haiti is in the bottom 10% of nations
worldwide. The UN's human development index pegs it at 145th of
169 studied. The only greater cesspools are in Africa.
In his seminal 2000 book, The Mystery of Capital, Peruvian
economist Hernando de Soto wrote that Haitians and Haitian
businesses had plenty of money, they merely lacked the methods
for leveraging that capital that North Americans and Europeans
take for granted.
Because Haiti was then (and remains) without an impartial
court system for defending property rights and had no means of
registering title in land or buildings, banks were unable to
lend money using property and possessions as collateral. By de
Soto's calculations, Haitians owned, in real estate alone, more
than 150 times the value of all direct investment made by
foreigners in the country's history, but it was what he termed
'dead capital.' Because they could not be used to acquire loans
to open new businesses, build new buildings, buy new machinery,
all these assets were 'dead' to the people who owned them.
It's easy to see how this lack of a functioning banking
and land titles system has crippled Haiti's recovery. While as
many as 150,000 homes were destroyed in and around the capital,
Port-au-Prince, alone--and 250,000 nationwide -- only about 5%
of Haitians had clear enough title their homes to obtain
insurance. If you put everything you have into building a house
that is then wiped out, but you lack insurance to rebuild it,
it might take years to save up enough cash to start over -- and
years longer, still, if you have no work and have to pay to
clean up the rubble of the old house, too.
So why should it come as a surprise to anyone that one
year after Haiti's devastating earthquake, there has been
little recovery?
Chile had a similarly forceful 'quake a little more than a
month later (Feb. 27, 2010). But as a modern, functioning
democracy with rule of law, independent courts, a robust
financial sector, sophisticated public and private
infrastructure, enforced building codes that prevented
structural devastation in the first place, a middle class and
professional class, Chile had largely resumed normal operations
within days. Power was back on, schools reopened, garbage was
collected and food delivered again to supermarkets. Within
weeks, most of the debris had been cleared away and
reconstruction begun.
Critics of the world's effort to help Haiti should
consider the contrast. How is that Chile was able to absorb the
shock of a major earthquake with little foreign aid, while
Haiti has received billions and is almost as chaotic and foul
now as it was in the immediate aftermath?
Writing in Wednesday's Halifax Chronicle Herald, that
paper's Ottawa reporter Stephan Maher blamed the governments of
donor nations -- including Canada's -- for having failed to
live up to their aid promises. Perhaps there has been some
shortfall. But it is hard to see how 50% more aid, or 100%, or
even 200% would have produced better results.
The problem is not lack of aid, it's lack of Haitian
ability to deal with the aid. Scores of brand-new, U.S.-donated
pickups sit, weed covered, for instance, at the Port-au-Prince
airport because, while aid groups could use them, the Haitian
government will not let them in until hundreds of thousands in
import duties are paid -- hundreds of thousands that would
likely end up in the pockets of Haitian officials.
Haiti is a true basket case. It has been misruled for so
long by drug lords, kleptocrats and voodoo cults that it
utterly lacks the civil culture needed to hold a valid
election, much less deal with the devastation it currently
faces.
The world should not wash its hands of Haiti, but it must
accept that money alone cannot fix what is broken there.
By Lorne Gunter
Jan. 14 (National Post) -- Of all the words I've read to
describe post-quake Haiti, the most apt is 'dystopian.'
Haiti is not only the poorest nation in the Western
hemisphere, it is also the most wretched and dysfunctional. By
nearly every measure -- stability of civil society, corruption,
GDP, per capita income -- Haiti is in the bottom 10% of nations
worldwide. The UN's human development index pegs it at 145th of
169 studied. The only greater cesspools are in Africa.
In his seminal 2000 book, The Mystery of Capital, Peruvian
economist Hernando de Soto wrote that Haitians and Haitian
businesses had plenty of money, they merely lacked the methods
for leveraging that capital that North Americans and Europeans
take for granted.
Because Haiti was then (and remains) without an impartial
court system for defending property rights and had no means of
registering title in land or buildings, banks were unable to
lend money using property and possessions as collateral. By de
Soto's calculations, Haitians owned, in real estate alone, more
than 150 times the value of all direct investment made by
foreigners in the country's history, but it was what he termed
'dead capital.' Because they could not be used to acquire loans
to open new businesses, build new buildings, buy new machinery,
all these assets were 'dead' to the people who owned them.
It's easy to see how this lack of a functioning banking
and land titles system has crippled Haiti's recovery. While as
many as 150,000 homes were destroyed in and around the capital,
Port-au-Prince, alone--and 250,000 nationwide -- only about 5%
of Haitians had clear enough title their homes to obtain
insurance. If you put everything you have into building a house
that is then wiped out, but you lack insurance to rebuild it,
it might take years to save up enough cash to start over -- and
years longer, still, if you have no work and have to pay to
clean up the rubble of the old house, too.
So why should it come as a surprise to anyone that one
year after Haiti's devastating earthquake, there has been
little recovery?
Chile had a similarly forceful 'quake a little more than a
month later (Feb. 27, 2010). But as a modern, functioning
democracy with rule of law, independent courts, a robust
financial sector, sophisticated public and private
infrastructure, enforced building codes that prevented
structural devastation in the first place, a middle class and
professional class, Chile had largely resumed normal operations
within days. Power was back on, schools reopened, garbage was
collected and food delivered again to supermarkets. Within
weeks, most of the debris had been cleared away and
reconstruction begun.
Critics of the world's effort to help Haiti should
consider the contrast. How is that Chile was able to absorb the
shock of a major earthquake with little foreign aid, while
Haiti has received billions and is almost as chaotic and foul
now as it was in the immediate aftermath?
Writing in Wednesday's Halifax Chronicle Herald, that
paper's Ottawa reporter Stephan Maher blamed the governments of
donor nations -- including Canada's -- for having failed to
live up to their aid promises. Perhaps there has been some
shortfall. But it is hard to see how 50% more aid, or 100%, or
even 200% would have produced better results.
The problem is not lack of aid, it's lack of Haitian
ability to deal with the aid. Scores of brand-new, U.S.-donated
pickups sit, weed covered, for instance, at the Port-au-Prince
airport because, while aid groups could use them, the Haitian
government will not let them in until hundreds of thousands in
import duties are paid -- hundreds of thousands that would
likely end up in the pockets of Haitian officials.
Haiti is a true basket case. It has been misruled for so
long by drug lords, kleptocrats and voodoo cults that it
utterly lacks the civil culture needed to hold a valid
election, much less deal with the devastation it currently
faces.
The world should not wash its hands of Haiti, but it must
accept that money alone cannot fix what is broken there.
rachat de credit consommation
Date: 2011-06-30 03:49 am (UTC)Mon francais n'est pas tres bon, je suis de l'Allemagne.
Mon blog:
rachat credit taux ou Rachat de Credit (http://www.rachatdecredit.net) pour fonctionnaire
meilleur rachat de credit
Date: 2011-07-08 03:48 pm (UTC)Mon francais n'est pas tres bon, je suis de l'Allemagne.
Mon blog:
Credit immobilier (http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crédit_immobilier) ou rachat de credit immobilier (http://www.rachatdecredit.net)