Reinforcing the Cacao Sector in Haiti: Alliances, Access and Organization - Final Report
- The project is built on four components and the first is the largest by reach: 2,526 farmers trained on natural resource management, over 7,500 trained on farm management and improved production and pest practices, 265,102 cacao seedlings produced at cooperative, university and private-sector level, and regeneration squads clearing, trimming, weeding, pruning and replanting across 3,725 hectares.
- The genetic work is the part with the longest horizon. A genetic mapping of cacao in the Grand'Anse with the University of the West Indies established the region's diversity and identified trees with desirable traits; those elite trees were then multiplied by grafting through grafters the project trained, with clonal gardens set up at cooperative, university and private-company level to conserve and multiply the clones. CATIE was brought in to characterize the Haitian cacao agroforestry system, and nine demonstration gardens carried the learning on site.
- Component two attacks the value that is lost after the harvest rather than the yield itself: seven fermentation and drying centers built or reinforced, post-harvest training for 3,988 producers covering drying, storage and humidity control, and 2,986 kits on production and processing adapted, translated, printed and distributed. Organic certification was supported for two cooperatives and one private company, and small processing equipment went to eight local processors.
- Component three treats finance and governance as the binding constraint on cooperatives. Root Capital, later Caseli, ran financial diagnostics for 12 cooperatives with tailored technical assistance; a mapping of financial institutions in the Grand'Anse and a finance fair in Dame-Marie brought institutions in front of over 300 producers from four cooperatives; a study of farm operating costs and gains was produced specifically to demonstrate profitability and creditworthiness to lenders. Member databases were built so cooperatives could meet the traceability requirements of organic and Fairtrade certification, and work with the National Council of Cooperatives supported legalization.
- Component four is the study component, and its subjects name the gaps the project found: the position of women across the chain and the constraints on their integration; eight yield studies examining how yields changed after the hurricane; access to basic credit, including the financial and administrative conditions of access; and market access for cacao farmers across ten communes in Nord and Grand'Anse.
- Hurricane Matthew is the shock the report is written around, cited as the most important of the challenges and the reason the seedling and regeneration work was scaled as it was.
- The partnership is unusually broad for a value-chain project and is worth recording: the IDB and its Multilateral Investment Fund, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, CRS, Lutheran World Relief and Root Capital, working with MARNDR, CATIE, the University of the West Indies, the Fine Cacao and Chocolate Institute, the National Council of Cooperatives and INCAH.
The final report of a project implemented as a partnership between the Inter-American Development Bank, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, Catholic Relief Services, Lutheran World Relief and Root Capital, designed to strengthen the Haitian cacao sector for actors across the value chain. The report is organized around four components. The first aimed to improve yields and environmental management on small-scale cacao farms, working with CATIE to characterize the Haitian cacao agroforestry system, establishing nine demonstration gardens, and training 2,526 cacao farmers in natural-resource management.
The project also carried out a genetic mapping of cacao in the Grand'Anse with the University of the West Indies to establish regional genetic diversity and identify trees with desirable traits, then worked with the local firm Defi Developpement to multiply these elite trees by grafting and to establish clonal gardens at cooperative, university and private-company level. Following the destruction caused by Hurricane Matthew the project facilitated production of 265,102 cacao seedlings across cooperative, university and private-sector nurseries. NOTE: this document is a scanned PDF and requires OCR for full-text search.
How to cite
Catholic Relief Services (CRS); Lutheran World Relief (LWR); Root Capital; Inter-American Development Bank (IDB); Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), 2018, Reinforcing the Cacao Sector in Haiti: Alliances, Access and Organization - Final Report, https://agripubhaiti.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/CRS-Final-Report-CACAO.pdf