The first leg is developing local grassroots organizations through the creation and training of Local Development Committees (LDCs) within each rural community.

These committees are trained by Asosyasyon Peyizan Fondwa (the Association of the Peasants of Fondwa - APF), a national organization with 30 years of experience and extraordinary accomplishments in Fondwa and beyond.

Currently APF has 30 LDCs in five states including the Artibonite Valley, Central Plateau, South-East, South and Grand’Anse and one small group in each one of the other five states.

FJN is in the process of creating and establishing a Local Development Committee (LDCs) in each of 572 rural communities.

With adequate funding, LDCs  can include providing economic development toolkits.

Through Local Development Committees (LDCs), APF aligns three groups of actors in each of the communities who are working for the benefit of the people, but who are working back-to-back vs. collaboratively:

1) Local Organizations, including as many as 6-12 local organizations;

2) Professionals, who come once or twice a year to work in the community;

3) Elected Officials of the Azek and Kazek governing bodies.

The LDCs are comprised of

five (5) people, including: two representatives of the local organizations; one professional who will make a commitment to live in the community for three years, and two elected officials from the local Azek and Kazek governing bodies.

APF will help the LDC manage the community resources through the leadership of a full-time APF Field Consultant / Animator and three students/ college graduates from University of Fondwa.

To manage the LDCs and genuinely fuel economic development, the LDC will require a 5-year budget.

The $75,000 annual budget is broken down as follows:

 $15,000 for University of Fondwa tuition for three students per year to attend the Agronomy, Veterinary and Business Schools;

 $25,000 for the LDC office, equipment, energy, training, animator salary and transportation.

 $10,000 for APF oversight, project management, and harnessing of resources from Fonkoze, University

of Fondwa, private partnerships and other organizations;

 $25,000 for pursuing

socio-economic investment activities.

The second leg of the stool is the creation of a model for economic development.    There is an urgent need to help identify resources at the local level and to provide sustainability through the development and maintenance of those resources within the local communities.

Small business projects launched by Fonkoze and APF in Fondwa provide models for the manner in which local organization and ingenuity can be combined to begin the process of wealth creation within Haiti’s myriad rural communities.

APF will work closely with the local LDCs, the community’s UNIF graduates and the university in an effort to create income producing ventures, sustainable businesses and economic development projects. 

3 Legs will encourage conversations about possible Economic Investment Activities and attempt to raise funding to help launch those initiatives which hold the greatest promise of sustainability.

Economic Investment Activities can include  “pre-packaged” economic development tools and opportunities such as:

`1.) Smart Smallholder Farming and Value Chain Support of such valuable crops as Sweet Potatoes

2.) Microgirds and Utility Entrepreneurship

• Smart, Sweet Potato Farming & Value Chain Optimization

will include developing a toolkit of clean plants; growing resources such as farm implements, drip irrigation and smart farming technology; crop buy-backs; value-added manufacturing (including a children’s food program and nutrition bar); marketing; and sales.

This initiative will also include agri-business training; smart farming  "Internet of Things" technology; support for collaborative plant replications; tracking of outcomes in new metrics of crop-per-drop and yield-per-harvest; and producing optimum farm income and profits through instituting best practices from the U. S. and globally.

• Community Microgrids & Utility Entrepreneurship

as a critical infrastructure and economic enabler. 

Resources will include solar panels, inverters, storage, equipment for installations, purpose-based applications such as solar irrigation and product manufacturing, and systems for administration, marketing and payment processing. (NOTE:  depending on the scope of the Microgrid, FJN and the LDCs may need additional funds for this.)

Beyond supplying empowering electricity, when deploying the Microgrid solution FJN will also enable Solar Utility entrepreneurs, including training illiterate women in solar panel installations and in operating utility-type businesses. 

LEG 3 -- HIGHER EDUCATION:

At present Less than 1% of high school graduates in Haiti attend post-secondary education5.  Less than 25% of those who do complete college remain in Haiti. 

This brain-drain is among the worst in the world.

Further, university level education has been concentrated mostly in Haiti’s more populous centers and has done little to promote the principles of rural-based wealth creation.

So, in 2004, at the 200th anniversary of Haiti’s independence, Father Joseph presented his country with a gift in the form of the creation of the University of Fondwa (UNIF), Haiti’s only rural university. 

UNIF’s focus is providing higher education toward the specific goal of developing wealth in Haiti’s rural communities. 

The university offers three degrees - agronomy, veterinary medicine and business administration. 

While additional degree programs are planned, Father Joseph believes that these three disciplines provide the most fundamental foundation necessary for the creation of wealth within the farm-based communities of rural Haiti.  His hope is to return students educated in these respective fields to their home communities providing a growing resource of Haitian professionals throughout the 570 communal sections.

As of Fall 2016-17 the University of Fondwa serves some 90 students. Expansion to accommodate students from rural communities throughout the country is planned over the coming decade.

In late 2016, the Raising Haiti Foundation launched its Rural Development Scholarship Initiative (RDSI) as part of the 3 Legs project. 

The goal of the scholarship campaign is to raise funding in the US in order to provide qualified students from Haiti’s rural communities student loans to be forgiven (converted to scholarships) in exchange for three-years of post graduate service in the student’s home community.

The pilot phase of the project currently being implemented will add eighteen students selected by six respective Local Development committees for attendance began in the Spring of 2017.