Flag of Haiti

The Haiti team examines and seeks to address inequality affecting women and girls with disabilities—specifically, how inequality can be addressed in policies and programs.

The team is analyzing policies, conducting research, and providing workshops to the community on topics such as gender equality, education, employment, gender-based violence prevention, and electoral participation.

  • Samantha Junie Pierre, Union des femmes à mobilité réduite d’Haïti (UFMORH)
  • Émilio Néas, Coalition nationale des associations des personnes handicapées (CONAPH)
  • Jean Joseph Forgeas & Rose May Legouté, Réseau associatif national pour l’intégration des personnes handicapées (RANIPH)
  • Bedjoane Sulface, Femmes en action de la Société d’aide aux aveugles (FASHAA)
  • Marijo Pierre, Association des femmes handicapées du Sud (AFHS) in Les Cayes
  • Régine Diègue, Mouvement pour l’intégration et l’émancipation des femmes handicapées (MIEFH) in Cap Haïtien
  • Gélimène Petit-Dé, Association des femmes handicapées de l’Artibonite (AFHA) in Gonaives
  • Soinette Désir
  • Ilionor Louis, Égalité pour la connaissance, la communication et la liberté (ECCEL)
  • Dominique Masson & Stephen Baranyi, University of Ottawa

  • Stephen Baranyi, University of Ottawa (Co-Lead)
  • Marjorie Brutus, Université d’État d’Haïti (EDID-GHDI Partnership Coordinator for the Haiti team) 

  • Bureau du Secrétaire d’Etat à l’intégration des Personnes Handicapées (BSEIPH)
  • Réseau Associatif National pour l’Intégration des Personnes Handicapées (RANIPH)

  • Coalition nationale des associations de personnes handicapées (CONAPH) avec AFHS et MIEFH (Research Grant)
  • Organisation des handicapés en action pour le progrès (OHAP) (Research Grant)
  • Union des femmes à mobilité réduite d’Haïti (UFMORH) (Workshop Grant)
  • Nadal Surin, Université d’État d’Haïti (Scholarship)
  • Sandy François, Université d’État d’Haïti (Scholarship)
  • Valincia Faniola Jean Philippe, Université d’État d’Haïti (Scholarship)
  • Venadia Dessipe, Université du Québec à Montréal (Scholarship)

Key Priorities

  • Amend the 2012 Law for the Integration of Persons with Disabilities to reflect the recommendations of the UN CRPD, particularly on the inclusion of women and girls with disabilities, and ensure its subsequent implementation.
  • Amend gender equality policy to include women and girls with disabilities and ensure its implementation.
  • Make inclusive education more effective for women and girls with disabilities.
  • Increase access to employment for women with disabilities.
  • Increase the financial empowerment of women with disabilities in small businesses.
  • Prevent various forms of violence against women and girls, and support their legal steps to obtain justice after the fact.
  • Increase the participation of women with disabilities in the feminist movement and in Haitian electoral politics.
  • Increase access to information for women with a range of disabilities.
  • Strengthen the institutional capacity of women’s associations with disabilities.

Key Priorities

  • Amend the 2012 Law on the Integration of Persons with Disabilities to reflect the recommendations of the UN CRPD, particularly on the inclusion of women and girls with disabilities, and ensure its subsequent implementation.
  • Amend gender equality policy to include women and girls with disabilities and ensure its implementation.
  • Make inclusive education more effective for women and girls with disabilities.
  • Increase access to employment for women with disabilities.
  • Increase the financial empowerment of women with disabilities in small businesses.
  • Prevent various forms of violence against women and girls, and support their legal steps to obtain justice after the fact.
  • Increase the participation of women with disabilities in the feminist movement and in Haitian electoral politics.
  • Increase access to information for women with a range of disabilities.
  • Strengthen the institutional capacity of women’s associations with disabilities.

About Disability in Haiti

For various reasons, there has been no general census done in Haiti since 2003. In 2003, 1.5% of the total population were considered disabled, 51.2% of whom were women (63,570 people), and 11.6% were under the age of 18 (14,447 people).

  • Today, the UN suggests that approximately 1 million people in Haiti have disabilities (10% of the population). This is likely an underestimation of the actual proportion of the population living with major disabilities.
  • A significant proportion (about 10%) of these disabilities were caused or worsened by the 2010 earthquake.
  • In Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince, disability prevalence among women aged 5 and up is roughly 4.8%.
  • Enquête Mortalité, Morbidité et Utilisation des Services reports that 28% of women over 15 years of age have a disability and 5% have a severe form of disability.
A young girl in a white shirt wearing glasses and smiling

People with disabilities face barriers to working, such as the lack of accessible workplaces and limited access to education and training programs.

  • Many people with disabilities in Haiti are unemployed, and many live in extreme poverty. In addition, women and girls with disabilities often face violence linked to their disability and their gender.
  • The disability rights movement has built strong capacities and clear visions of alternative futures for people with disabilities.
  • Women with disabilities have created new associations, yet their voices are only beginning to be heard by the government, as well as by the historic disability rights and feminist movements.
Click to view sources
A young girl in a white shirt wearing glasses and smiling

About Disability in Haiti

For various reasons, there has been no general census done in Haiti since 2003. In 2003, 1.5% of the total population were considered disabled, 51.2% of whom were women (63,570 people), and 11.6% were under the age of 18 (14,447 people).

  • Today, the UN suggests that approximately 1 million people in Haiti have disabilities (10% of the population). This is likely an underestimation of the actual proportion of the population living with major disabilities.
  • A significant proportion (about 10%) of these disabilities were caused or worsened by the 2010 earthquake.
  • In Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince, disability prevalence among women aged 5 and up is roughly 4.8%.
  • Enquête Mortalité, Morbidité et Utilisation des Services reports that 28% of women over 15 years of age have a disability and 5% have a severe form of disability.

People with disabilities face barriers to working, such as the lack of accessible workplaces and limited access to education and training programs.

  • Many people with disabilities in Haiti are unemployed, and many live in extreme poverty. In addition, women and girls with disabilities often face violence linked to their disability and their gender.
  • The disability rights movement has built strong capacities and clear visions of alternative futures for people with disabilities.
  • Women with disabilities have created new associations, yet their voices are only beginning to be heard by the government, as well as by the historic disability rights and feminist movements.
Click to view sources

Recommended Reading

Haiti: Snapshot of Human Rights Commitments and Recommendations

Ratified: 2009; Most recent report: 2015

Selected Recommendations from the Expert Committee (2018):

  • Eliminate the use of offensive language when referring to people with disabilities.
  • Explicitly prohibit discrimination on the grounds of disability.
  • Integrate the rights of women and girls with disabilities into gender equality legislation, and conduct public awareness campaigns to modify stereotypes, prejudices and myths about women and girls with disabilities.
  • Ensure the inclusion of children with disabilities in the national strategy for the protection of the child.
  • Enact appropriate legislation to ensure the removal of obstacles to access to justice and to guarantee the provision of procedural, gender- and age-appropriate accommodations based on the free choice and preference of persons with disabilities.

Ratified: 1981; Most recent report: 2014

Selected Recommendations from the Expert Committee (2016):

  • Develop a national strategy, and ensure that it is adequately resourced, to promote and empower women at all levels of political and public life.
  • Take measures to close the existing wage gap between women and men and implement the principle of equal pay for work of equal value.
  • Implement the gender equality action plan included in the Strategic Development Plan for Haiti.

Ratified 1995; Most recent report 2015

Selected Recommendations from Expert Committee (2016)

  • Eliminate societal discrimination against girls through public educational programmes, including campaigns, organized in cooperation with civil society organizations, opinion leaders, families and the media to combat the stereotyping of gender roles and build the competence of teachers and other personnel at all levels of the education system on gender equality
  • Ensure that sexual and reproductive health education is part of the mandatory school curriculum and targeted at adolescent girls and boys, with special attention on preventing early pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections
  • Enforce the law prohibiting the employment of children under 15 years of age and criminalize the practice of placing children in domestic service.
  • Access full CRC Concluding Observations Report for Haiti

Haiti: Snapshot of Human Rights Commitments and Recommendations

Ratified: 2009; Most recent report: 2015

Selected Recommendations from the Expert Committee (2018):

  • Eliminate the use of offensive language when referring to people with disabilities.
  • Explicitly prohibit discrimination on the grounds of disability.
  • Integrate the rights of women and girls with disabilities into gender equality legislation, and conduct public awareness campaigns to modify stereotypes, prejudices and myths about women and girls with disabilities.
  • Ensure the inclusion of children with disabilities in the national strategy for the protection of the child.
  • Enact appropriate legislation to ensure the removal of obstacles to access to justice and to guarantee the provision of procedural, gender- and age-appropriate accommodations based on the free choice and preference of persons with disabilities.

Ratified: 1981; Most recent report: 2014

Selected Recommendations from the Expert Committee (2016):

  • Develop a national strategy, and ensure that it is adequately resourced, to promote and empower women at all levels of political and public life.
  • Take measures to close the existing wage gap between women and men and implement the principle of equal pay for work of equal value.
  • Implement the gender equality action plan included in the Strategic Development Plan for Haiti.

Ratified 1995; Most recent report 2015

Selected Recommendations from Expert Committee (2016)

  • Eliminate societal discrimination against girls through public educational programmes, including campaigns, organized in cooperation with civil society organizations, opinion leaders, families and the media to combat the stereotyping of gender roles and build the competence of teachers and other personnel at all levels of the education system on gender equality
  • Ensure that sexual and reproductive health education is part of the mandatory school curriculum and targeted at adolescent girls and boys, with special attention on preventing early pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections
  • Enforce the law prohibiting the employment of children under 15 years of age and criminalize the practice of placing children in domestic service.
  • Access full CRC Concluding Observations Report for Haiti

Recommended Reading

Connect with us!

EMAIL: edid-ghdi@uoguelph.ca

X/TWITTER: @edid_ghdi

BLUESKY: @edid-ghdi.bsky.social

LINKEDIN: https://www.linkedin.com/company/edid-ghdi

YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/@EDID-GHDI

BLOG: https://liveworkwell.ca/category/edid-ghdi

INSTAGRAM: Coming Soon!

MAIL: Live Work Well Research Centre, University of Guelph, Attention: EDID-GHDI, 501 MacKinnon Building, 50 Stone Rd E, Guelph, Ontario, Canada N1G 2W1

Connect with us!

EMAIL: edid-ghdi@uoguelph.ca

TWITTER: @edid-ghdi

INSTAGRAM: @edid_ghdi

MAIL: Live Work Well Research Centre, University of Guelph, Attention: EDID-GHDI, 501 MacKinnon Building, 50 Stone Rd E, Guelph, Ontario, Canada N1G 2W1