NEW YORK. – Amid destruction, resulting from a 7.0-magnitude powerful earthquake that hard hit Haiti on January 12th, the Batey Relief Alliance (BRA) is already putting in place a collaborative relief effort to address immediate needs of the country’s population. Click HERE for more details.

Help for Haiti
BRA’s CEO, Ulrick Gaillard said that his organization’s short-term objective is to relieve immediate sufferings in the surrounding Port-au-Prince and SouthEast Department areas, including Jacmel. Their long-term plan, however, is to repair basic services, deliver sustainable healthcare and clean water, and provide training and economic opportunities to women.

BRA’s existing capacity in the region includes two fully functional medical centers in Southeast border of Haiti and in neighboring Dominican Republic’s batey, trained emergency response staff (medical, water, nutrition), availability of emergency supplies and food, agriculture staff for replanting and recovery efforts, water/sanitation experience, including well projects for border and batey populations, and duty free privileges with government for humanitarian deliveries into Haiti. “Our immediate focus is to work with the Haitian Diaspora and our strategic partners to channel support to where it is most needed and deliver emergency supplies,” added Gaillard.

But Gaillard cautioned that individual donations of in-kind goods to ship into Haiti, while they are important, are not the best approach at this time with almost all Haiti’s airports, ports and government offices shut down. BRA will use its DR headquarters to receive and purchase goods and transport them into Haiti by crossing the border.

Help Haiti. Donate alternatively. DONATE to Batey Relief Alliance.
BRA’s immediate need is to raise the most funds as possible. The organization encourages everyone from any part of the globe to visit its website at www.bateyrelief.org, click on DONATE NOW, and make a gift. For those who wish to mail in their checks, to make them payable to Batey Relief Alliance, P.O. Box 300565, Brooklyn, N.Y. 11230.

BRA’s CEO narrowly escaped tragedy
Gaillard traveled the week before the earthquake to Haiti for a post award meeting with USAID and to sign an agreement with Haiti’s Ministry of Health to operate a medical center at the border region (click HERE). “I left Port-au-Prince just one day before the earthquake. Had I posted my return, I would have probably not made it. But my heart breaks tremendously for the thousands who perished,” concluded Gaillard.

Contact BRA at bra@bateyrelief.org or (917) 627-5026.

The situation:
HAITI was hard hit by a 7.0 earthquake, 10 miles from the capital, Port-au-Prince where close to half of its 9-million population lives. In the capital, it is reported that thousands of buildings and shacks have been destroyed; bodies laid on the streets; and panic all over the place. For more details click HERE.

Batey Relief Alliance’s reponse:
• Relieve immediate suffering (delivering food, medical care, clean water, and emergency supplies)
• Repair basic services to levels that are better than they were before
• Provide economic support to women

Immediate Need:
• Funds to purchase goods, shipment and distribution

HELP HAITI: DONATE

NEW YORK, January 1, 2010. – The Batey Relief Alliance (BRA) is launching two new programs addressing socio-economic needs of populations living in extreme poverty in both Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Last year, BRA received $2.5 million from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the US Agency for International Development (USAID) to improve agriculture development for farmers inside the DR agricultural batey communities and provide training and microcredit loans to women in the SouthEast border region of Haiti.

The USDA-funded Cooperative Agricultural Program aims at creating food security and economic development for impoverished batey communities in the province of Monte Plata, by putting 7,700 unemployed farmers to work 1,500 acres of fertile land to produce food for 32,000 people. It is expected that surplus crops will be sold to local communities by the cooperative – an effort to foster long-term sustainable re-investment into the program.

The USAID-funded Women’s Empowerment Program, under its new Development Grants Program, will allow BRA to partner with key local partner groups such as FONKOZE, Partners In Health and Esperanza International, to establish 30 women’s organizations, provide training to 600 hundred women, of which, 300 to receive microcredit loans to start or maintain small businesses. Additionally, BRA signed an agreement with Haiti’s Ministry of Health on January 11, 2010 to operate a medical center in the border region’s commune of Anse-a-Pitres. Click HERE for more details. The program targets Haiti’s SouthEast department, Capital of Jacmel, District of Belle Anse, covering the communes of Belle Anse, Grand Gosier, Thiotte and Anse-a-Pitres.

“In light of the current global economic crisis affecting millions around the world, especially in poor countries like Haiti and the Dominican Republic, BRA’s programs are timely as they will provide thousands with economic tools to meet their current economic hardships, and to better themselves and their communities,” said Ulrick Gaillard, BRA’s CEO.