By Ramon Sahmkow, AFP

PUNTA CANA, Domini­can Repub­lic — Haiti faces an “immense chal­lenge” to rebuild after January’s earth­quake, Pres­i­dent Rene Preval told a donors’ con­fer­ence Wednes­day called to speed pay­ment of bil­lions of dol­lars in pledges.

Recov­ery projects to be financed with the 10 bil­lion dol­lars promised from an ini­tial donors’ meet­ing in New York in March will pro­duce “a more decen­tral­ized, fairer Haiti,” Preval told the event in the Domini­can Repub­lic resort of Punta Cana.

For­mer US pres­i­dent Bill Clin­ton, who co-chairs a com­mis­sion with Hait­ian Prime Min­is­ter Jean-Max Bel­lerive over­see­ing much of the recon­struc­tion funds, called on donors to make good on their pledges to real­ize those plans.

So far, only Brazil has stumped up all its promised sum — 55 mil­lion dol­lars — accord­ing to the Hait­ian econ­omy ministry.

Wednesday’s con­fer­ence, titled the “World Sum­mit for the Future of Haiti,” was aimed at extract­ing more of the pledged money, defin­ing recon­struc­tion projects and dead­lines, as well as reas­sur­ing donor coun­tries that the World Bank would over­see the process to min­i­mize embez­zle­ment and corruption.

“Today, we have a very clear frame­work in terms of what we must do,” said Orga­ni­za­tion of Amer­i­can States Sec­re­tary Gen­eral Jose Miguel Insulza. “This is not just a meet­ing to look over what has been done, but really to set out a pro­gram, adopt it and put it into action.”

The event was attended by top offi­cials from Europe and the Amer­i­cas, with more than 50 coun­tries represented.

Accord­ing to aid experts, Haiti needs about 11.5 bil­lion dol­lars for its antic­i­pated decade-long rebuild­ing effort.

The Jan­u­ary 12 earth­quake effec­tively lev­eled the cap­i­tal Port-au-Prince, killing more than 250,000 peo­ple and leav­ing 1.3 mil­lion liv­ing in pre­car­i­ous tent camps exposed to trop­i­cal storms in Haiti, which shares the island of His­pan­iola with the Domini­can Republic.

The econ­omy of Haiti — already the poor­est coun­try in the Amer­i­cas — was badly hit.

Even though inter­na­tional aid has flowed in, the mag­ni­tude of the dis­as­ter means recon­struc­tion efforts have been slow to materialize.

Much of the country’s infra­struc­ture — roads, water dis­tri­b­u­tion and elec­tric­ity — has to be rebuilt, along with schools and universities.

Domini­can Pres­i­dent Leonel Fer­nan­dez, host­ing the con­fer­ence, stressed that “Haiti is not alone, and never will be.”

The Interim Com­mis­sion for the Recon­struc­tion of Haiti (ICRH) headed by Clin­ton and Bel­lerive has an 18-month man­date to over­see rebuild­ing. After that time has elapsed, the Hait­ian gov­ern­ment is to take full charge.

The World Bank said last week it had can­celed Haiti’s remain­ing debt of 36 mil­lion dol­lars to help the coun­try pur­sue its reconstruction.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has also urged coun­tries to set favor­able trade terms for Hait­ian busi­nesses, in a bid to help speed Haiti’s recovery.

The United Nations has warned Haiti against any uncon­sti­tu­tional change of lead­er­ship amid moves by the oppo­si­tion to force Preval to resign, but it backed moves to hold elec­tions by the end of the year.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5g7jWRAHWtppX2RB7rfiMoUuJYJ1w