Mapping the Haitian Music Industry

A mapping of Haiti's music industry, carried out by the Haitian association of music professionals after it won a 2016 call for proposals from UNESCO's International Fund for Cultural Diversity. It surveys the sector as an economy rather than as a culture: who the entities are, what they earn, how they are organized and where they are.

The market it describes is about 11 million people at home plus some 2 million Haitians in the diaspora, and the study is direct about the limits that market imposes: the economy is largely informal and the market disparate, which bounds what any commercial strategy can assume. 365 entities were surveyed, of which 35.89 percent, more than a third, are concentrated in a way the report sets out. Sampling was allocated by department, with the Artibonite at 19 percent of the target and 3 enumerators for 237.5 planned questionnaires, the Centre at 8 percent with 2 enumerators for 100, and the Nord at 12 percent with 2 enumerators for 150.

The report states plainly that it was conducted in conditions of extreme urgency and that its results are therefore partial. That caveat is worth keeping, because it is the only sector-wide measurement of the Haitian music economy available, and the temptation is to read partial coverage as a full census.