Port red tape rots food.

While millions of Haitians go hungry, containers full of food are stacking up in the nation's ports because of government red tape--leaving tons of beans, rice and other staples to rot under a sweltering sun or be devoured by vermin, reports AP (March 6, 2 008):

A government attempt to clean up a corrupt port system that has helped make Haiti a major conduit for Colombian cocaine has added new layers of bureaucracy, and led to backlogs so severe they are being felt 600 miles away in Miami, where cargo shipments to Haiti have ground almost to a standstill. The problems are depriving desperate people of donated food. An AP investigation found the situation is most severe in Cap-Haitien, Haiti's second-largest city. One recent afternoon, garbage men shoveled a pile of rotting pinto beans that had turned gray and crumbled to dust as cockroaches and beetles scurried about. The men had found the putrid cargo by following a stench through stacked shipping containers to one holding 40,000 pounds of beans. It had been in port since November. "So many times, by the time (the food) gets out of customs it's expired and we're forced to burn it," said Susie Scott Krabacher, whose Colorado-based Mercy and Sharing Foundation has worked in Haiti for 14 years. "The food is there. It is available. It just can't get to the people";

Haiti imports about 75% of its food, according to the U.S. Dept of Agriculture. The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization reported that almost half the population was undernourished in 2002. The U.N. World Food Program and large-scale U.S. rice growers say they have been able to get their food into Haiti by hiring local agents to handle bureaucratic procedures. But smaller charities, merchants and private citizens have often been forced by the delays to throw away containers of food or pay exorbitant fees.