Answers to your questions — Haiti
Nearly six months have passed since the earthquake. Why are there still more than a million people living in camps? There are several reasons people are still in camps: lack of land available to people who have no homes to return to; rubble preventing returns and blocking new construction; and a lack of incentive for people to leave the camps, where they have access to services like water and toilets.
So, why isn’t there enough land in Haiti? Land ownership in Haiti has been unequal since colonial times: most of the land is owned by very few people. Land tenure – meaning who can own land, and the security of that ownership – must be reformed in Haiti. But this is not a new idea – reform has been attempted multiple times by Haitian leaders. Comprehensive reform is not going to happen in six months; it will take years. What the government can do now is enforce existing laws, so renters can return to their homes without worrying they will have to pay for repairs or face inflated prices.
