Change Fund Principles in Action: Accountable + Always Learning: The story of Haiti Survie in Haiti
Join us as we continue with our series of impact stories from NEAR’s Flagship Solution: The Change Fund, highlighting five of the Fund's Principles: Swift, Trust-based, Locally led, Context Sensitive + Flexible, Accountable + Always Learning. Our fourth story is about our member, Haïti Survie, in Haiti, exemplifying the Change Fund being Accountable + Always Learning as principles in practice.
If your efforts to help people get basic supplies are under attack, how do you continue?
Workers with the local organisation Haiti Survie regularly ask themselves that question. Co-founder Aldrin Calixte and his team find ways to continue assisting communities caught up in violence in Haiti’s capital despite dangerous conditions.
From February to March 2025, violence in Haiti escalated and set a sobering record: 60,000 people were forced to flee within a month.
For individuals and families who’d been uprooted, the Lycée des Jeunes Filles was a safe zone to take refuge, drink water, and rest. Until it wasn’t.
The area came under attack several times, and the people Haiti Survie was supporting there were sent onto the streets again, seeking safety.
The situation is risky, not only for community members, but also for the Haiti Survie team. Each time team members go to work in those areas, they conduct a quick assessment. Real-time evaluation and adaptation are a constant part of their response.
Even when people move from one of their sites, Haiti Survie works to find them and continues providing support.
“Accountability, for us, is one of our policies,” Aldrin says. “We have to be accountable to those persons, because we work for them."
Keeping communities informed about activities from the start of an emergency response through all stages of support is how they build community capacity and prioritise each person’s dignity.
With those commitments in mind, Haiti Survie reached more than 3,800 people with water and hygiene interventions, cash transfers, psychosocial support, and other assistance during a five-month project launched with a Change Fund grant.
In the world’s most challenging humanitarian crises, community-based support is critical. People need local organisations that will continue their work even when the situation worsens. And those organisations need flexibility to carry out the most effective responses.
The Change Fund supports local leaders like Aldrin, strengthens local organisations like Haiti Survie, and ensures resources for crisis-affected communities.