Submitted by Stephen LaFrenie (not verified) on Sat, 10/20/2007 - 16:09.
I am on the Board of Directors for a Canadian charity called Third World Awareness and also a federal Green Party candidate in Toronto. We have been working on a school project in cite soleil since 2005. We have managed to build a kitchen facility and the first story of the school which now houses 200 students. Beginning in 2005 we began paying our work crew the wage they asked for. 200 Haitian dollars (1,000 gourdes)per day for the foreman and $100 Haitian (500 gourdes) for labourers. The year we built the school in 2006 we increased the wage for brick layers to $150 Haitian (750 gourdes)and kept the $100/day for the general labourers. The foreman and the school administrators did the hiring without interference from us. The school has been a success to date but of course needs more funding.
That aside we have no problem paying this wage as a small group and fail to see why other NGOs cannot follow suit. The fact that the minimum wage may be 70 gourdes/day legally is no excuse to abide by it. Yes we could have hired more people but what would that have accomplished. As it is the few men who work on the project can only afford to feed their families for a month with the money they earn from us over the 10 - 20 days the project is going. (We go down once a year in May). NGOs and all relief groups, religious and otherwise should commit to paying the real minimum wage regardless. I am tired of hearing the excuse that more people can benefit with the lower wage. Making someone work 6 days to earn enough money to feed their children and themselves for only 2 days is not progressive in any sense.
All support organizations and their donors should support and commit to paying a real minimum wage in order to pressure industry and businesses to follow.
All relief organizations should commit to minimum wage
I am on the Board of Directors for a Canadian charity called Third World Awareness and also a federal Green Party candidate in Toronto. We have been working on a school project in cite soleil since 2005. We have managed to build a kitchen facility and the first story of the school which now houses 200 students. Beginning in 2005 we began paying our work crew the wage they asked for. 200 Haitian dollars (1,000 gourdes)per day for the foreman and $100 Haitian (500 gourdes) for labourers. The year we built the school in 2006 we increased the wage for brick layers to $150 Haitian (750 gourdes)and kept the $100/day for the general labourers. The foreman and the school administrators did the hiring without interference from us. The school has been a success to date but of course needs more funding.
That aside we have no problem paying this wage as a small group and fail to see why other NGOs cannot follow suit. The fact that the minimum wage may be 70 gourdes/day legally is no excuse to abide by it. Yes we could have hired more people but what would that have accomplished. As it is the few men who work on the project can only afford to feed their families for a month with the money they earn from us over the 10 - 20 days the project is going. (We go down once a year in May). NGOs and all relief groups, religious and otherwise should commit to paying the real minimum wage regardless. I am tired of hearing the excuse that more people can benefit with the lower wage. Making someone work 6 days to earn enough money to feed their children and themselves for only 2 days is not progressive in any sense.
All support organizations and their donors should support and commit to paying a real minimum wage in order to pressure industry and businesses to follow.