In Haiti, hungry lives & early deaths: governments rise and fall, but do little to help the nation's impoverished people and devastated economy.

• Author: Weiner, Tim
• Position: International

Diplomats call Haiti a "failed state," a nation done in by dictators and disasters. What that means is a hungry life and an early death for many of the 5 million people in Haiti's little villages, places like Plaine Danger, about 500 miles from Florida and light-years from Port-au-Prince, the capital, where President Jean-Bertrand Aristide fell from power on Feb. 29.

Aristide promised to make life better in Haiti, where public health, education, and the economy have been collapsing for decades. But he never did; no Haitian leader ever has, and many made life worse. Governments rise and fall, doing nothing to stop Haiti from sliding into the sea.

Haiti is, in fact, slowly disappearing. The soil slides off the steep hills, where trees are burned to make charcoal, the only thing people can sell for a profit. "There are no trees to hold the land and when it rains, the earth washes away," says Didier Dipera, a farmer in Plaine Danger.

Jeanne Bazard, who is pregnant with her sixth child, is one of many Haitians who sell charcoal to get by. "When I put a dollar together I walk up the hill and buy a bag of charcoal and then walk into town to sell it," she says. "If I leave at dawn I arrive at 9. It might sell for twice as much there."

Cutting down the trees began in the 18th century with the French slave masters who ran Haiti. Even after Haitian independence in 1804, the French bought and cut millions of mahogany trees; by World War I, they were almost gone. Now, close to 90 percent of the nation is denuded.

Today, the economy is based on burning. "People have no choice but to make charcoal," says Alexis Charlemagne, 40, a nurse in the port of Jeremie. "There are no jobs, no factory here, and charcoal is a quick buck."

There once was a fishing fleet in Jeremie, but the boats left with the boat people, the thousands of Haitians who have sought refuge in the U.S. from hunger and oppression, and never returned. (There are more than 400,000 Haitians in the U.S., mostly in New York and Miami.)

'IT DOESN'T MATTER WHO'S IN POWER'

With her charcoal money, Bazard buys roots, rice, and beans--one simple meal a day for herself and her children.

"I only care about whether we can eat," she says. "It doesn't matter who's in power. We've never gotten anything from anyone in power. The least any leader could do would be to make jobs so we could buy an animal or two and find a way for my kids to go to school. It's not possible For my kids to have a better life than...