Stories of Success in Haiti: Dieulita (Part 3/5)

As we count down to the one-year anniversary of the earthquake that devastated Haiti, we’d like to reflect on the stories of the individuals we’ve helped recover and rebuild their lives. This series of posts includes the stories of people who have been able to recover from the biggest catastrophe in their country’s history.

Dieulita

This is the story of a member of Fonkoze’s Chemen Lavi Miyo program, for which BRAC provides technical assistance.

Eight months ago when Dieulita Fleuri became a member of Fonkoze’s Chemen Lavi Miyo project in the Central Plateau, her life was consumed with just one task each day: finding food for her five children. Eking out a daily existence consumed Dieulita, yet rarely did her children eat on consecutive days.

“Most days, I would boil leaves and hope the next day would be better” she says. Things became so difficult that she sent her two oldest daughters, 16 and 18 years old, to live with a cousin in Port-au-Prince. Her sons, 12 and 14 years old, ran away to live with their dad in the Artibonite 15 miles away. She has a three-year-old with the man she has been living with for the past six years.

Today, Dieulita is making big plans. Dieulita has confidence in her future. “For the first time in my life, I look forward to waking up and starting my day.” She plans to send for her boys, now that she believes she will be able to put food on the table for them regularly. She hopes one day her daughters will return and work with her.

Although she has just begun, Dieulita is building a successful business. Since becoming a CLM member, she has been training to become a micro-entrepreneur. With the help of the program, she started selling food products such as rice, oil, beans and sugar.

“There was too much competition,” she says. So with the help of her case manager, she switched to selling chickens and ducks.

This business has flourished. “On a good day, I can buy 10 to 20 chickens and ducks and resale them that same day at a good profit in the market place.” She goes to work at the open market three times a week, and spends the rest of the week tending to her goats and her small farm plot at home.

Before starting CLM, Dieulita had virtually no assets, and certainly no assets that would produce income. She was given three goats through the program, but now, just eight months later, she has six goats. She also has many chickens and a small garden of corn and beans.