*Deportation have also affected families
*Deportations have a significant impact on cattle ranching
*Communities are beginning to feel the effects of deportations
*The country and Haiti share a 376-kilometer border
*Criminal groups dedicated to smuggling Haitians have emerged in the past few years
*Deportations are felt by traders on both sides of the border
*Deportations have a significant impact on cattle ranching
*Communities are beginning to feel the effects of deportations
*The country and Haiti share a 376-kilometer border
*Criminal groups dedicated to smuggling Haitians have emerged in the past few years
*Deportations are felt by traders on both sides of the border
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NewsTranscript
00:00In the Dominican Republic, the government is deporting 10,000 Haitians per week,
00:05which is creating a major problem for Haitians and Dominicans.
00:09Our correspondent Daisy Toussaint with the details.
00:15Massive deportations of Haitians in the Dominican Republic are having a significant
00:20impact on key sectors such as livestock, agriculture and commerce, where Haitian workers play a key role.
00:26What has been most affected is the productive sector, especially the cattle ranchers in the
00:34border zone, whose main source of workers are Haitian nationals working on the farms.
00:44In Dajabon, on the northern border of the Dominican Republic,
00:47Haitians and Dominicans live side by side, but the deportations have also affected families
00:53because many Dominican-Haitian couples with children run the risk of being left alone
00:57when one of the parents is deported.
01:05The way repatriations have been carried out has not been perhaps the most praiseworthy thing.
01:09I believe that first a survey should have been made by sector, by community.
01:15Of the type of family there is, the type of person, what they do,
01:18and make a data bank to know how to act, and I believe that this is what has failed the most
01:22here, because here they deport everyone who is Haitian, and not only Haitians,
01:26but black people, they grab them and put them on the trucks for deportation.
01:40But beyond the family separation, there is the impact on livestock.
01:45Elide is a cattle rancher who has a farm of supermies, a type of cane that serves as a
01:50feed supplement for the cows to produce milk. The Haitians plant it, maintain it,
01:55cut it and move it to the feeding trough to grind it and feed it to the cattle.
01:59He fears that the deportations will cause a collapse in the agricultural sector.
02:07If the measures being taken by the Dominican authorities are maintained,
02:11as radical as the fact that everyone has to leave, this sector will collapse.
02:16Here there are cattle ranchers who have 80 cows that have to be milked.
02:20There are others who have 100 and they all depend on Haitian labor.
02:29We visited Francisco, a farmer in the community of Los Arroyos,
02:33who is feeling firsthand the impact of deportations on agriculture.
02:37The other impact is on agriculture and already here in our village it is feeling.
02:46That is, we do not have workers for the cleaning of the fruits.
02:57I don't have workers right now because sometimes those hired say they are coming and they don't
03:03come because the authorities take them away and that creates serious difficulties for us to produce.
03:15Francisco points out that the measure established by the Dominican government did not take into
03:19account the opinion of the sectors that are being affected today.
03:24The government did not think of a plan. They thought of an element within a migration plan
03:30and the deportation element is one. But they should have taken into account,
03:35for example, the producers. They should have analyzed and seen how we could solve these
03:40difficulties. Because the Haitians are the ones who produce and my farm cannot produce without
03:45Haitians. Maybe I will have to sell and close down everything.
03:51The Dominican Republic and Haiti share a 376-kilometer border, of which 164 kilometers
04:00of border fence have been built, the rest being controlled by the military. However,
04:05thousands of Haitians cross the border without a document. How does this happen? The answer
04:11comes from Nancy Batances, a community leader who works with the Network for the Protection of
04:17Children and Adolescents in the border province of Dajabon.
04:23The passport for the Haitians is the money they can have and that they can pay.
04:31There are many Haitians who are dedicated to transporting people illegally
04:35within the Dominican Republic. But many times the Haitians they transport die.
04:40And there are no statistics on the Haitians who are abandoned by these smugglers and criminals.
04:45In response to the immigrants' need for survival,
04:48criminal groups dedicated to the transport of undocumented Haitians have emerged.
04:58These criminal groups are dedicated to transporting Haitians into the country.
05:05I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler.
05:08I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler.
05:12I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler.
05:17I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler.
05:19I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler.
05:21I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler.
05:23I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler.
05:25I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler.
05:27I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler.
05:29I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler.
05:31I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler.
05:33I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler.
05:35I am a smuggler. I am a smuggler.
05:37Trade between the two countries generates millions of dollars annually for the Dominican Republic and deportations are also felt by traders on both sides of the border.
05:50I think that removing all the Haitians is not in the best interest of any of us as a country.
05:58Because a lot of labor in the Dominican Republic depends on Haitians.
06:08It is a reality, many companies, many farms that are working in the production of rice, in the production of bananas and many other products depend on Haitian labor.
06:19There is a lot of forced labor that Dominicans do not really want to do.
06:24Massive deportations of Haitians on the border between the Dominican Republic and Haiti have transformed the regional dynamics.
06:32Irregular migration and corruption aggravate the situation, revealing humanitarian and economic challenges for both countries.