Nouvelle Vie, Cap Haitian

They received agrant from USAID to train a group of 19 youth leaders from across the country

in a holistic program that would allow them to be stronger individuals, entrepreneurs, and

community leaders, calling it Nouvelle Vie. Youth were recruited from Les Cayes, Jacmel,

Hinche, Cap Haitian, Port au Prince, and other areas and brought to Cap Haitian where they

lived for several months undergoing intensive training in subjects ranging from permaculture (a holistic and sustainable approach to everything from agriculture to construction), mindfulness meditation, community leadership, yoga, nutrition, stress management, and entrepreneurship. Afterwards, the youth returned to their homes to try to put what they learned into action, either through their own sustainable businesses or through community initiatives.

 

The group in Cap Haitian consists of two of the Nouvelle Vie graduates, who have decided to

turn the house which they are living in into a full training center. They offer yoga sessions every

Saturday and meditation every Sunday, and they go into rural communities across the North

Department to offer trainings to farmers cooperatives on permaculture methods of composting

and planting. They also receive requests for trainings constantly and have trained hundreds in

a range of subjects. Their house is a demonstration center in and of itself: they have installed

a rooftop garden that displays the principles of urban gardening by using recycled car tires

as planters, and they have successfully managed a vermaculture installation by cultivating a

handfull of earthworms given to them a year ago into tens of thousands of earthworms that are

now producing high-quality compost that they can use in their garden or sell.