H-Haiti "PetroCaribe: Who, What, Where, When, Why" by TEAM WOY

Discussion published by Marlene Daut on Tuesday, September 4, 2018 PetroCaribe: Who, What, Where, When, Why by TEAM WOY

The words “Petro Caribe” have been trending on Haiti Twitter for the last few weeks, and maybe you don’t know what any of it means. For those of you who are from Haiti or who love Haiti, but don’t know what exactly is going on, we wanted to break it down for you to clear up the confusion. We’ve gathered some videos, articles, and links that can explain why people are asking, “Where is the PetroCaribe money??”

What is PetroCaribe?

PetroCaribe is a petroleum program between Venezuela and a number of countries in the Caribbean and Latin America. Basically, Venezuela sells petroleum to these nations at a preferential rate, paying only 5-50% of the cost upfront. The remainder of the cost is considered a loan to be paid back over a 25 year period at a low 1% interest rate. Are you with me still? Basically, Venezuela is giving us a huge discount on petroleum upfront, and they are giving us 25 years to pay back the rest.

What this means is, if the Haitian government is only having to pay a fraction of what they would spend on petroleum, this leaves them with a bunch of money saved. The point of the program is to allow these nations to use this money they would have spent on petroleum towards developmental projects (i.e. schools, hospitals, etc.)

Read more here: http://woymagazine.com/2018/09/02/petrocaribe-who-what-where-when-why/

Citation: Marlene Daut. "PetroCaribe: Who, What, Where, When, Why" by TEAM WOY. H-Haiti. 09-04-2018. https://networks.h-net.org/node/116721/discussions/2328109/petrocaribe-who-what-where-when-why-team-woy Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. 1