A close friend in college once told me I could never become the president of Haiti because I am the wrong color. In Haiti, people are sometimes discriminated against because of their skin color. People like me, who are relatively light-skinned, are less than 5% of the population. Although this group may hold 90% of the country’s wealth, I myself come from a humble family with an international mix of grandparents. However, my parents strongly believed in education and allowed me to go to the best schools they could afford. I also got an opportunity to study in the USA with a scholarship. This not only introduced me to the beautiful diversity of our world, but also allowed me to be in an environment where many different worlds intersect.
Even if I can’t become president, I can still contribute to my country in other ways. With this in mind, I have worked as a community builder since college. After graduating, I worked for the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank as a country economist. The Haitian economy has seen negative growth over the past 20 years, and I always felt compelled to use my power to connect people and share the knowledge I was privileged to capture.
My mission was accelerated when I discovered the power of technology at the age of 30. I quit my job and started a social business called Banj. We are the first entrepreneurship hub and business accelerator in Haiti. We partnered with Facebook and Google to push the power of tech and entrepreneurship in Haiti through an ecosystem*3 building process that connects local and international parties.
I believe in the power of networking to open people’s minds and create partnerships that can transform society. My hope is to connect the ones with access to unexploited traditional assets in Haiti with the new generation full of energy and creativity to disrupt the economy and change the perception of Haiti in the world. There’s a long way to go with so many hurdles to overcome. From people’s mentality to access to the internet and traditional infrastructures (electricity and roads), we know change is a marathon. However, we are convinced that as much technology has transformed the world, we will be the pioneers of change in Haiti. If we succeed in our home, this adventure can be replicated in other low-income countries around the world. That’s my dream and the model I want to leave for future generations.
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