#3171: Letter to the editor: A response

[Robert Corbett <bcorbett@netcom.com>]

From:Jepiem@aol.com

I would consider this only a temporary measure which would not really solve 
the problem in the long run. As you make space for more people, more people 
would be produced through the simple process of reproduction. Twenty years 
from now we would be facing the same problem. Programs should be oriented 
towards:
 a) Raising the standard of living of the existing population. First throw 
out the politicians and don't let them get access to any of the aid money. 
Develop roads, industries for export, ease the restrictions to encourage the 
influx of foreign investment capital, bring in expertise to develop and 
supervise programs, clean up the general mess of unnegotiable traffic and 
horrible pollution, reclaim all the stolen state lands from those that 
appropriated them under previous governments and make them into cooperative 
land to foster agriculture so that the country can again become self 
sufficient as far as food production, and, in the same light develop programs 
to encourage agriculture.etc.......
b) educate the population in the  necessity and the wisdom of birth control. 
Before this can be done, birth control has to effectively become an 
attractive alternative to thoughtless sex followed by unplanned reproduction.
 Haiti of course  has a long way to go before anyone can even consider such 
programs in the whole. May be it will never get there, but if foreigners want 
to really help this is the kind of thinking they should be armed with instead 
of patch up immediate results kinds of measures. Haiti did not get into this 
ugly mess in one day or one year. It will take time, patience and 
perseverance to pull it out of it and that will require Haitians in Haiti and 
abroad as well as foreign help that are truly committed.