The organisation’s president, Catherine Hanck, explained that working in Haiti has become increasingly difficult while donations and financial support in Luxembourg have steadily declined. Hanck, who works in education, first travelled to Haiti in 2007 – a visit that deeply moved her. She later returned in 2016 while completing her studies.
“From that moment on, I could not let go. A few years later, I became the president of the organisation”, she said.
Founded in 2004, Action Avenir Haiti initially aimed to support financially disadvantaged Haitians by providing microloans to help them realise their projects. In 2009, the organisation expanded its efforts to fund a primary school in Carrefour’s Rivière Froide district, a suburb of Port-au-Prince.
“That school building was severely damaged in the devastating 2010 earthquake. As a response, we bought the land and built a new school on the site”, Hanck explains.
Thanks to these efforts, around 600 children were able to complete their education – an opportunity they otherwise would not have had due to financial constraints, Hanck noted with pride.
However, she also lamented the growing challenges to their work in recent years: “Since 2019, armed gangs have taken control, mainly in the capital and its surrounding areas. Today, approximately 85% of Port-au-Prince is ruled by these gangs.”
As a result, the Luxembourg aid organisation has not returned to the country since then. Some of its local collaborators, including school staff, have also fled to due to escalating gang violence.
“Kidnappings have surged in recent years, and many Haitians are on the run. By mid-2024, around 700,000 Haitians were internally displaced. Many have been shot or injured, making it impossible for us to continue our work on the ground”, says Hanck.
She also underlines the decline in volunteer engagement in Luxembourg over the past years, along with a drop in donations and subsidies: “After the severe 2010 earthquake, we received a significant number of donations, allowing us to keep financial reserves, but these funds are being gradually used up. And finding new donors has become increasingly hard.”
With the remaining resources, Action Avenir Haiti will be able to fund the primary school in Carrefour for the current school year. The organisation officially disbanded last month, and local school staff and collaborators are now searching for alternative solutions to keep the school running beyond this year.
