“Men anpil, chay pa lou.” (Many hands make the load light.)
I have carried this proverb with me for as long as I can remember, and I hear it now as I think about the lifelines our people send home — those steady streams from Boston, Miami, Montreal, Paris, Santiago — and how they flow into the hands of mothers, brothers, cousins, neighbors.
They are the many hands already at work. And yet, as I reflect, I see how much lighter the load could be if we gave these streams a common direction, a deliberate course, so that they might carry more than survival — they might carry transformation.
My own study of the Philippine experience has left me in that curious state of being impressed and unsettled at once. I have admired their breadth of vision — a policy that works on the national, bilateral, and multilateral fronts — and yet I have been aware of the seams and fractures beneath it: the difficulty of enforcing protections, the temptation to celebrate deployment numbers while neglecting the conditions under which people live and work abroad.
I want us to learn from that model, but also to surpass it — to do, in short, what Haiti has never been afraid to do when necessity and imagination conspire.
Principles I Cannot Let Go
First, I must insist on equity. If we are to take these billions in remittances and make them the backbone of development, they cannot serve only those fortunate enough to have relatives abroad. They must spill over into infrastructure, education, and the patient building of local economies.
Second, I believe in protection. It is not enough for a Haitian to find work in Santiago or New York; it matters profoundly that the work is safe, that the wage is fair, that dignity travels with the passport.
Third, I think constantly about sustainability. We must invest these funds in structures and institutions that outlast the moment — that survive political seasons and personal fortunes.
And finally, I see that none of this can be done in isolation. Our approach must be layered — the national machinery, the bilateral agreements, the multilateral commitments — each speaking to and reinforcing the other.
On Our Own Ground
I would begin at home, with an institution that could both serve and defend our people: the Haitian Office for Diaspora and Migrant Affairs (HODMA). I imagine it as autonomous, yet answerable to the Prime Minister, and unlike certain foreign models, entirely free from the conflict of selling our labor while pretending to protect it.
Alongside it, a Haitian Diaspora Development Fund (HDDF), independent, audited, and jointly governed by diaspora voices, civil society, and the state.
I would finance it modestly — a voluntary solidarity contribution on formal transfers, matched by state or donor support, and the issuance of diaspora bonds. In this way, the remittance, without losing its private character, takes on a public one.
Turning Private Flows into Public Growth
I have been struck, in the Philippine case, by how much of the remitted dollar ends up as consumption. Necessary, yes — but insufficient. In Haiti, I would make it possible for every gourde saved in a certified remittance account to be matched for investment in small and medium enterprises, agricultural cooperatives, and the sort of community infrastructure that changes daily life.
I would insist on universal digital access to these services. To leave whole communes outside the financial map would be to admit, from the start, that the policy is for some Haitians and not for all.
Before They Leave
I think often of the moment just before departure — the farewell in the airport’s humid air, the weight of the suitcase, the uncertain future. It is here we can equip our people: a National Pre-Departure Orientation Program (NPDO) that teaches rights, financial literacy, and job-specific skills. This is not charity; it is strategy.
The Necessary Conversations Abroad
I have learned that agreements made face-to-face matter more than lofty declarations. I would seek binding Bilateral Labor Agreements (BLAs) with the countries where our people go in greatest numbers — the United States, Canada, France, the Dominican Republic, Chile — with enforceable clauses on wages, conditions, and automatic enrollment in portable social security.
I am not interested in the polite but toothless Memorandum of Understanding; I have seen how such documents soothe consciences without changing realities.
And I would go further: using these talks to lower the cost of sending money home, until the fee no longer feels like a tax on love.
Our Place in the World’s Forums
I am persuaded that we must take our voice to the broader tables — the International Labour Organization (ILO), the United Nations’ conventions on migrant workers, the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) — but only if we are prepared to enforce at home what we ratify abroad. Too often, membership has been the end of the effort. I would make it the beginning.
How I Would Keep Us Honest
I want an annual State of the Diaspora Remittance Impact Report, published in Creole and French, co-written with diaspora representatives, and read not only in Port-au-Prince but in Brooklyn, Montreal, and Santiago. I want an Ombudsman for Migrant Affairs, with the power to investigate, to shame, and to correct.
The Road I See Ahead
In the first two years, I would set up HODMA and the HDDF, launch the solidarity contribution, and negotiate two pilot labor agreements. In the next three, I would expand investment programs, deepen the CARICOM initiative, and ratify key ILO conventions. By year ten, I would want to see half of all formal remittances flowing through accounts that double as development engines, and universal access to digital transfers.
I do not imagine this as a perfect design — policy rarely is — but as a framework that recognizes what we have: a diaspora willing to give, a nation in need of more than subsistence, and a moment in which the gap between the two can be bridged.
If we treat our people abroad not merely as senders of money but as co-architects of Haiti’s future, then perhaps the remittance, born of absence, can become a presence in every Haitian life.
“Piti piti zwazo fè nich li.” (Little by little, the bird builds its nest.)
This, too, is what I believe: that steady effort, wisely guided, can make something enduring.
