HAITI: Scraping by on Mud Cookies

By Wadner Pierre
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Aug 27 (IPS) At six in the morning in Cite Soleil, the
poorest zone of
Haiti's capital city, the sun is already up. It's the start of
another workday for Lurene Jeanti, making cookies from mud,
butter and salt. She's been mixing the ingredients on the side
of the road to sell to her neighbours for the past eight
years.

"The mud helps me take care of my children," she says
matter-of-factly.

Jeanti is a slight, muscled woman, one of millions of
Haitians who have migrated from the countryside to Port-au-
Prince over the past decade. She left her hometown to find a
way to feed her five kids.

"My children have no father. I am the mother and the father
of them," Jeanti told IPS. The father is gone and Haiti has
no statutes protecting women who are abandoned with their
children.

Jeanti grew up in Anse D'Hainault, a remote town in Haiti's
southwest near Grand Anse, known as the "city of poets".
Ezer Villaire, one of the great Haitian poets, was born and
raised there.

Unlike other parts of rural Haiti, trees still populate the
mountains and little plateaus where yams and cacao are
grown. "Have you visited Anse D'Hainault? It's really nice.
You should go," she told IPS. "I used to farm. I am a
farmer."

But the income from farming small crops wasn't enough.
Unemployment rates rise to 80-90 percent in much of the
countryside.

Now Jeanti lives in Cité Saint Georges, a tiny district
within Cité Soleil. The concrete canal running through the
neighbourhood is full to the brim with plastic bottles.

She sits in a dirty corner near the entrance to a narrow
corridor where people come to buy mud cookies or a gallon of
water from a neighbour. Most the houses are made with
concrete blocks and unfinished.

During her first two years in Port-Au-Prince, Jeanti managed
the products she brought from Anse D'hainault. But it wasn't
enough, so she started baking and selling mud cookies
herself.

"I buy two bags of mud for 500 gourdes (12.57 U.S.). And I
made 100 gourdes (2.50 U.S.)," she told IPS.

Mud cookies are big business. The mud mine is located in the
central of Haiti. A cookie-maker like Jeanti has to buy the
mud from middle-man who purchases it from someone with
access to the mine, then brings it to Port-Au-Prince.

Jeanti wants to go back to her town Anse D'hainault to take
of her mother. She is the only daughter. "I want to come
back to my home. My mother is getting old. I have to come
back to take of her. I am her unique daughter," she
explained.

But she is worried about how she is going to support her
five children, plus her mother. "I have one problem. I can't
come back with 2,500 gourdes to Anse D'ahainault. It is not
going to help me. But I am getting old as my mom. I'm 49.
And… I have to come back to Anse D'Hainault," she said.

Jeanti knows her story is like those of many Haitian single
mothers. "I am not the only one who is making mud cookies to
sell. There are many women here who are doing the same
business like I do to support their children." She points to
a group of women drying mud cookies on top of the roof.

The voice of Lurene Jeanti is the voice of many hundreds of
thousands Haitian women who left their towns to come to
Port-Au-Prince in the hope that life will smile on them.
With 1.5 million people living in tent camps months after
the devastating Jan. 12 earthquake, it doesn't appear their
situation will improve anytime soon.

While 5.3 billion dollars was pledged by international
donors to aid in the rebuilding, less than 20 percent has
been disbursed.