How rice imports, the Creole pig eradication, and dollarization dismantled Haiti’s food system—and why returning to the lakou model matters now.
The Crisis Has a Backstory
When Haiti’s food crisis is discussed today, the explanations usually begin with instability, disasters, or corruption. These are real forces, but they describe outcomes, not origins. They tell us what the crisis looks like, not how it was built.
Haiti did not forget how to farm.
Haiti was systematically stripped of the systems that allowed families to thrive.
To understand why rice is scarce, why imported food dominates markets, and why so many rural families were pushed into cities and then out of the country, we must examine three interlocking blows that reshaped everyday life:
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Rice policies that undercut local farmers and altered diets.
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The eradication of the Creole pig, which destroyed rural savings and resilience.
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The erosion of trust in the gourde, which destabilized household planning and investment.
These shocks unfolded alongside political upheaval and weakened institutions. Together, they fractured Haiti’s food sovereignty long before the present moment.
Before the Collapse: Lakou, Trade, and a Life Beyond Cash
After the Haitian Revolution, formerly enslaved people rejected the plantation system that had defined colonial Saint-Domingue. Instead, they reorganized land into lakou, a family-centered system that was economic, social, and spiritual at once.
Lakou life allowed families not just to survive, but to thrive. It was built on mixed farming, shared labor, and reciprocal exchange. Money mattered, but it was not always necessary. If a household lacked cash, it could trade food, labor, or livestock. Value circulated through relationships rather than banks.
This system gave rise to one of Haiti’s most enduring economic institutions: the madan sara network. Haitian women farmers and traders moved goods from lakou to market through rotating, non-Western market systems that ensured access across regions. These women became the backbone of local commerce, linking rural production to urban consumption with remarkable efficiency.
Lakou did not aim to produce wealth for global markets. It produced food, stability, and autonomy for families. That distinction would later be used against it.
Blow #1: Rice and the Reshaping of the Haitian Plate
For generations, Haitians consumed locally grown rice, particularly from the Artibonite Valley. This rice was unbleached, nutrient-rich, and adapted to local soil and climate. It supported farmers, nourished families, and circulated wealth domestically.
Trade liberalization in the late twentieth century changed this balance. Tariffs protecting Haitian rice were reduced, while subsidized U.S. rice entered the market at lower prices. Haitian farmers could not compete with a product whose true cost was hidden by foreign subsidies.
The impact went beyond economics. Imported rice was not nutritionally equivalent. Haitians shifted from whole, locally grown rice to enriched, heavily processed varieties. Over time, this dietary change contributed to health problems, including increased rates of diabetes and other diet-related illnesses.
Years later, Bill Clinton acknowledged that these policies damaged Haiti’s ability to produce its own rice. While they benefited American farmers, they undermined local food systems.
Haitian farmers did not fail. They were displaced.
Haitian diets did not deteriorate by choice. They were altered by policy.
Blow #2: The Creole Pig and the Destruction of Rural Savings
If rice policy weakened production, the eradication of the Creole pig destroyed savings.
Before the 1980s, nearly every rural Haitian household raised Creole pigs. These small black pigs were hardy, disease-resistant, and perfectly suited to lakou life. They required little capital and thrived alongside crops, improving soil quality as they foraged.
The pig was more than livestock. It was a living savings account.
Families sold pigs to pay school fees, cover medical emergencies, or finance important life events. In a system where formal banking was inaccessible or irrelevant, pigs stored value over time.
In the early 1980s, a program to eradicate pigs in Haiti was launched under the justification of preventing African swine fever from reaching North American herds. Nearly every Creole pig in the country was killed. Only a handful of farmers managed to hide pigs, allowing a small remnant of the breed to survive to this day.
Replacement pigs were introduced later, but they required purchased feed, cement enclosures, and veterinary care that most rural families could not afford. Promised repopulation programs failed to restore what was lost.
When the pigs disappeared, so did:
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Rural savings
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Children’s access to education
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Women’s trading capital
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A critical buffer against crisis
This was not just economic loss. It was psychological and social trauma, experienced in real time by families forced to watch their livelihoods destroyed.
Blow #3: Dollars Over the Gourde
As rural economies weakened and political instability deepened, confidence in Haiti’s national currency eroded. Inflation and volatility pushed households toward U.S. dollars as a perceived store of value.
Over time, everyday life became increasingly dollarized. Rent, school fees, and even food prices were quoted in USD. Savings were held in dollars when possible. The gourde became something to spend quickly, not to trust.
This shift had profound consequences:
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Families struggled to plan long-term.
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Farmers hesitated to invest before harvest.
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Local markets lost price stability.
A food system depends on predictability. When currency trust collapses, so does the ability to invest, produce, and exchange locally.
The Political Context: Instability as an Accelerator
These economic shocks did not occur in a vacuum. They unfolded during periods of intense political upheaval.
In the early 1990s, Haiti experienced coups, sanctions, and the removal of its first democratically elected president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Although he would later return, interim governments and external pressures further weakened already fragile institutions.
During this period, rural families were losing pigs, farmers were being priced out of rice production, and households were abandoning the gourde. Political instability did not create these problems, but it magnified them. There was no institutional buffer to protect farmers, rebuild herds, or stabilize currency confidence.
The Domino Effect: From Lakou to Urban Pressure
The combined effect of rice displacement, pig eradication, and dollarization triggered a cascade:
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Rural economies collapsed.
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Families left agriculture to survive.
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Migration toward cities accelerated.
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Urban centers became overcrowded.
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Food imports and aid filled the gaps.
Food aid saved lives and continues to do so in emergencies. But aid cannot replace a food system. When imported food becomes routine, it further discourages local production and investment.
What followed was not dependency by choice, but dependency by design.
Gendered Consequences and Social Strain
The collapse of rural systems hit women hardest. Madan sara networks lost capital. Women who once financed trade through pigs and crops found themselves excluded from markets.
As household resources shrank, difficult decisions followed. Girls were often pulled from school before boys. Household stress increased. Gender-based inequalities widened.
Food sovereignty is inseparable from gender justice. When rural systems collapse, women lose not only income, but influence and security.
What This Means Today
When Haiti’s hunger is discussed now, it is often framed as inevitability. But the history tells a different story.
Haiti did not lose sovereignty all at once.
It lost it transaction by transaction, pig by pig, grain by grain, dollar by dollar.
These were material systems. When they collapsed together, autonomy collapsed with them.
Yet the lakou never fully disappeared. It persisted in memory, in practice, and in land still held by families.
Looking Ahead to Part II
Haiti’s future does not lie in endless aid cycles or romanticizing the past. It lies in remembering forward.
In Part II: The Lakou Path Back: Food Sovereignty Through Intellectual Rematriation, we explore how families, educators, and the diaspora can help restore what was interrupted, not through charity, but through knowledge, investment, and commitment.
Because Haiti’s future is not imported.
It is grown, lakou by lakou.
HaitiDecoded connects history to possibility. Through stories, books, and learning tools, we help families understand the past so they can participate in rebuilding the future.