{"id":2320,"date":"2010-11-11T03:42:37","date_gmt":"2010-11-11T08:42:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/?p=2320"},"modified":"2010-11-11T03:43:14","modified_gmt":"2010-11-11T08:43:14","slug":"deforestation-erosion-and-cholera-in-haiti","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/2010\/11\/11\/deforestation-erosion-and-cholera-in-haiti\/","title":{"rendered":"Deforestation, erosion and Cholera in Haiti"},"content":{"rendered":"

There is an interesting and provocative recent article on the Huffington Post website by Ethan Budiansky<\/a>, who works for an NGO called Trees for the Future<\/a>, which seeks to assist communities and farmers in less developed countries to plant woodlands in order to mitigate environmental damage. The article looks at the issue of deforestation in Haiti, and attempts to link the ongoing cholera outbreak across the country to the rampant deforestation there. That deforestation is an issue in Haiti is beyond doubt – indeed I have blogged on this previously<\/a>. I am certainly not the first to note that the border between the Dominican Republic (to the east and north in the Google Earth image below) and Haiti (to the south and west – the white line is the approximate location of the border) is visible from the air purely on the basis of the remarkable change in forest density:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The reasons for the forest loss to this extent are of course complex, but include the extreme levels of poverty in what has been to all intents and purposes a failed state,\u00a0in which\u00a0fuel security and management of resources (i.e. prevention of uncontrolled logging)\u00a0have both been deeply problematic.\u00a0 Note from the image above that in general\u00a0the land has not been converted to agricultural use, and hence is not being managed.\u00a0 This is of course a tropical environment with high rainfall intensities, and indeed tropical cyclones, meaning that erosion is inevitably a major issue.<\/p>\n

The article argues that deforestation may be one of the causes of the cholera outbreak.\u00a0 The thesis\u00a0has a number of dimensions, all stemming from the loss of forest.\u00a0 This forest loss leads to a decline in biodiversity and hence to poor quality soils, which are then susceptible to\u00a0erosion during rainfall.\u00a0\u00a0 Apart from causing landslides, this erosion pollutes the water courses and prevents the production of food, leading to a vulnerable population.\u00a0 The clogging of the water courses is also important as this allows the formation of pools of water that rapidly become stagnant and thus dangerous.\u00a0 Meanwhile, the population has to rely on the\u00a0rivers for the supply of\u00a0 water, meaning that they are immediately exposed to disease.<\/p>\n

The combination of people with a low level of resilience to disease and a polluted and clogged water delivery system, and I suspect a population that has to cope with regular mudslides, leads to increased likelihood of Cholera, with lethal effects.\u00a0 Inevitably the proposed solution is to plant more trees.\u00a0 Of course this is not a short term fix.\u00a0 Indeed it will not\u00a0mitigate the current outbreak of Cholera, or even outbreaks in the next few years.\u00a0 However, the idea is that in the medium to long term afforestation will start to play role in mitigating the risks.<\/p>\n

Whilst I find some of the arguments and technical details\u00a0a little unclear (I wonder whether there is real evidence that the erosion is creating pools of water in the water courses in this way, and I wonder whether trees really raise the watertable through the action of their roots for example), the idea is certainly interesting and provocative.\u00a0 The underlying message is certainly correct – i.e. that reforestation must be a key component of the rehabilitation of Haiti, but this can only be successful if the civil measures are in place that prevent unsustainable use of the forests.\u00a0 This is going to be a long haul.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Deforestation is a major problem in Haiti, with 98% of natural woodlands having been removed. This post highlights a recent suggestion by an NGO that deforestation may be in part a cause of the current cholera outbreak in Haiti. Whilst this idea is unproven, the need for afforestation to be a part of the rehabilitation of Haiti is undeniable.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":2321,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[367,469,68],"class_list":["post-2320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-deforestation","tag-featured","tag-haiti"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2320","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2320"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2320\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}