Country Facts - Haiti

The People

Ethnic Composition

Black	95%
Mulatto/White	5%

Religious Composition

Roman Catholic	80%
Protestant	16%
Baptist 10%
Pentacostal 4%
Adventist 1%
Other	4%
None	1%

Languages Spoken

French, and Creole, both official

Education and Literacy

45 percent of the population over the age of 15 can read. By gender, 48 percent of the male population, and 42.2 percent of the female population are literate.

Labor Force

Total: 3.6 million (1995)
By occupation:

Agriculture	66%
Services	25%
Industry	9%

Note: shortage of skilled labor, unskilled labor abundant (2001)

Geography

Land Mass Total

35,151 sq mi (27,750 sq km)

Land

10,640 sq mi (27,560 sq km)

Water

73 sq mi (190 sq km)

Land Boundaries

Total: 223 mi (360 km)
Border countries: Dominican Republic 223 mi (360 km)

Coastline

1,100 mi (1,771 km)

Maritime claim

Contiguous zone: 24 nm
Continental shelf: to depth of exploitation
Exclusive economic zone: 200 nm
Territorial sea: 12 nm

Climate/Weather

Tropical; semiarid where mountains in east cut off trade winds.

Terrain

Mostly rough and mountainous.

Elevation extremes

Lowest: Caribbean Sea 0 ft (0 m)
Highest: Chaine de la Selle 8,792 ft (2,680 m)

Natural Resources

Bauxite, copper, calcium carbonate, gold, marble, hydropower.

Land use

Arable land	20%
Permanent crops	13%
Other	67%

(1998)

Natural hazards

Lies in the middle of the hurricane belt and subject to severe storms from June to October; occasional flooding and earthquakes; periodic droughts.

Environment - current issues

Extensive deforestation (much of the remaining forested land is being cleared for agriculture and used as fuel); soil erosion; inadequate supplies of potable water.

Geography Note

Haiti shares island of Hispaniola with Dominican Republic (western one-third is Haiti, eastern two-thirds is the Dominican Republic).

Demographics

Population

7,063,722 (2002)
Note: estimates for this country explicitly take into account the effects of excess mortality due to AIDS; this can result in lower life expectancy, higher infant mortality and death rates, lower population and growth rates, and changes in the distribution of population by age and sex than would otherwise be expected.

Age structure

0-14 years:	39.5%	male 1,414,052	female 1,377,693
15-64 years:	56.3%	male 1,924,867	female 2,049,952
65 years and over:	4.2%	male 142,657	female 154,501

Growth Rate

1.42% (2002)

Life Expectancy

49.55 years (2002)
female: 51.29 years
male: 47.88 years

GDP Per Capita

Purchasing power parity
US$1,700 (2001)

Infant Mortality

93.35 deaths/1,000 live births (2002)

Sex ratio

At birth:	1.05 male(s)/female
Under 15 years:	1.03 male(s)/female
15-64 years:	0.94 male(s)/female
65 years and over:	0.92 male(s)/female
Total population:	0.97 male(s)/female

Net migration rate

-2.31 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2002)

Economy & Trade

About 80 percent of the population lives in abject poverty. Nearly 70 percent of all Haitians depend on the agriculture sector, which consists mainly of small-scale subsistence farming and employs about two-thirds of the economically active work force. The country has experienced little job creation since the former President Preval took office in February 1996, although the informal economy is growing. Following legislative elections in May 2000, fraught with irregularities, international donors - including the U.S. and E.U.--suspended almost all aid to Haiti. The economy shrank an estimated 1.2 percent in 2001, and the contraction brought the economy to zero-percent growth in 2002. Prospects look better for 2003, although only one-percent growth is predicted with more substantial advance (3 percent) for 2004. No substantial progress will be made, however, until Haiti resolves its internal political conflicts..

Unemployment

Widespread unemployment and underemployment; more than two-thirds of the labor force do not have formal jobs (2001).

Inflation Rate

14% (2001)

Industries

Sugar refining, flour milling, textiles, cement, tourism, light assembly industries based on imported parts.

Exports

$326.6 million (f.o.b., 2001)

Imports

$977.5 million (c.i.f., 2001)

Total Trade

Purchasing power parity
GDP US$12 billion (2001)

Top Export Partners

US 90%, EU 6% (2000)

Top Import Partners

US 60%, EU 10.5%, Dominican Republic 3.7% (2000)

Top Exports

Manufactures, coffee, oils, cocoa

Top Imports

Food, manufactured goods, machinery and transport equipment, fuels, raw materials

Debt - external

US$1.2 billion (1999)

Economic aid

Recipient: US$730.6 million (1995)

Fiscal Year:

October 1 to September 30

Business Workweek

	Monday - Friday	Saturday - Sunday
Offices	8a.m. to 4p.m.	Closed
Retail	8a.m. to 4p.m.	Saturdays 8a.m. to noon.
Banks	9a.m. to 4:30p.m.	Some banks open on Saturdays 9a.m. to 1p.m.
Government	8a.m. to 4p.m.	Saturday 8a.m. to 4p.m.

Holidays

Official Holidays

Holidays	2003	2004	2005
Independence Day (1804)	January 1	January 1	January 1
Ancestry Day	January 2	January 2	January 2
Easter¹	April 20	April 11	March 27
Easter Monday	April 21	April 12	March 28
Death of Toussaint Louverture	April 7	April 7	April 7
Americas Day	April 14	April 14	April 14
Labor Day	May 1	May1	May 1
Ascension²	May 9	May 29	May 20
Flag Day and University Day	May 18	May 18	May 18
Sovereignty and Thanksgiving Day	May 22	May 22	May 22
Corpus Christi³	June 19	June 10	May 26
Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary	August 15	August 15	August 15
Death of Henri Christophe	October 8	October 8	October 8
Death of Jean-Jacques Dessalines	October 17	October 17	October 17
United Nations Day	October 24	October 24	October 24
All Saints Day (All Souls' Day)	November 1 and 2	November 1 and 2	November 1 and 2
Armed Forces Day (Vertieres)	November 18	November 18	November 18
Discovery of Haiti	December 5	December 5	December 5
Christmas Day*¹	December 25	December 25	December 25

¹	Easter, a Christian holiday celebrating the resurrection of Jesus Christ, is the first Sunday after the full moon and the vernal equinox (fixed in the Gregorian calendar at March 21), and often observed with Good Friday and Easter Monday. In the West, Easter is predicted using the Gregorian calendar, while Eastern Orthodox Christians use the much older Julian calendar, and celebrate 13 days later.
²	The feast of Ascension takes place 40 days after Easter in both the Christian and Orthodox faiths and celebrates the ascent of Christ into Heaven.
³	Western Catholic feast commorating the Eucharist, takes place 60 days after Easter, and is typically the time when believers take their first communion.
*¹	Christmas celebrates the birth of Jesus Christ. In A.D.320, Pope Julius I fixed the date at December 25 based on the Gregorian calendar. The Orthodox church calculates Christmas using the Julian calendar and celebrates 13 days later on January 7.

Country information used by permission of World Trade Press