Haiti - Cayes Meeting Minutes, June 25, 2026

Content

• Presentation of ongoing activities and areas of intervention for humanitarian partners. 

Interventions in the Sud department are heavily concentrated in the sectors of agriculture, food security, WASH, education, protection, nutrition, and community resilience-building, with a particular focus on municipalities affected by the 2021 earthquake and vulnerable populations exposed to climate and socioeconomic shocks. 

For more details on interventions by organization, please contact the coordination team.

• Logistics Sector: Role, Mandate, and Mission

• Objective of this section: To strengthen participants’ understanding of logistics coordination mechanisms and ensure better dissemination of information at the operational level, a brief presentation on the role, mandate, and missions of the Logistics Sector may be included in the agenda of subnational meetings. This activity will be carried out at the discretion of the Logistics Sector team, depending on the needs and context of each meeting.
• Humanitarian Reform: In 2004, an evaluation of response operations in Sudan highlighted the following issues: Recurring leadership issues, persistent gaps, a lack of predictability and/or accountability, ad hoc interventions, inconsistent coordination, and fragile partnerships.
• This led to the implementation of the “cluster approach” by the IASC (Inter-Agency Standing Committee).
• What is the cluster approach? The primary mission of a cluster is coordination: 
• It was established to ensure improvements in the quality, effectiveness, and efficiency of humanitarian responses. 
• Although it is a partnership-based initiative, the cluster system also aimed to establish clearer lines of accountability, enhance predictability, and improve global capacities.
• What is the logistics cluster:
• A community of partners;
• Collaborating to overcome logistical constraints and improve the overall humanitarian logistics response
• Led by partner organizations at the global and national levels
• WFP has been designated as the lead agency for the cluster.
• The cluster enables us to: 
• To unite our efforts,
• To act together,
• To prepare together,
• To innovate together.

Toward the Merger of the Logistics and Telecommunications Clusters

• The Humanitarian Reset is an initiative launched within the international humanitarian system aimed at achieving greater impact with fewer resources through better coordination and leaner structures.
• As part of the Humanitarian Reset, the Logistics Cluster and the ETC have been brought together under a common platform called the Logistics and Telecommunications Cluster (LTC).
• The idea is that these two clusters provide enabling services to the entire humanitarian community: 
• Logistics enables the delivery of aid.
• Telecommunications enable coordination, information sharing, and security.

• Key logistical challenges faced in 2025 and early 2026

• Objective of this section: Subregional coordination meetings provide a forum for identifying the main logistical challenges and gaps faced by humanitarian actors in the region. Discussions focus in particular on physical access, transportation, warehousing, logistics support services, and the procurement of goods and services necessary for the implementation of humanitarian operations.
• Limited access to vehicle maintenance and repair services: Humanitarian partners face significant constraints regarding vehicle maintenance, primarily due to a shortage of qualified mechanics in certain regions and difficulties in procuring certain spare parts.
• To address this need, the World Food Program (WFP) recently established a vehicle repair service in areas where it has a sub-office. This service is currently operational in Cap-Haïtien, Gonaïves, Port-au-Prince, and the Greater South—specifically in Miragoâne and Jérémie—thus covering parts of the West, Nippes, South, Southeast, and Grand’Anse departments.
• However, several partners have pointed out that these services remain far from certain areas of operation and have expressed the need for more accessible maintenance solutions closer to their operational bases.
• Deterioration of road infrastructure and humanitarian access constraints: In these regions, access constraints are generally not related to insecurity but rather to the poor condition of road infrastructure.
• Partners operating in the Grand Sud have reported numerous difficulties in reaching certain vulnerable communities due to severely deteriorated roads. For example, the road connecting Jacmel to Thiotte is in such poor condition that vehicles traveling on it frequently break down.
• This situation has several operational consequences:
• Longer delivery times for humanitarian aid;
• Higher logistics costs and vehicle maintenance expenses;
• Limited access to the most isolated communities;
• A potential reduction in certain donors’ willingness to fund interventions in areas that are particularly difficult to access.
• Paradoxically, these hard-to-reach areas are often home to some of the most vulnerable populations with significant humanitarian needs, which underscores the need to improve access to them.
• Access to Remote Areas and Maritime Transport: The issue of maritime transport to certain hard-to-reach areas has been raised as a potential solution to the constraints posed by the state of road infrastructure (e.g., Belle-Anse). However, it should be noted that the WFP’s maritime service relies primarily on the use of vessels with pre-established routes and schedules that call at ports capable of accommodating them. Furthermore, transportation by sailboats—which previously served as a suitable alternative for reaching these areas—was provided as part of a project implemented by Humanity & Inclusion (HI). However, this project ended in July 2025 due to a lack of funding, thereby reducing the transportation options available to the most isolated communities. 
• Weak local market infrastructure and supply constraints: Supply challenges in the region go beyond the limited availability of certain products or their high cost. They stem primarily from the largely informal nature of local markets, which complicates compliance with humanitarian organizations’ procurement procedures.
• Most partners are required to adhere to strict financial compliance and procurement rules, including the obligation to solicit multiple quotes from different suppliers and to establish long-term agreements (LTAs) for certain goods and services.
• However, many local suppliers are unfamiliar with these administrative requirements. Preparing formal quotes and providing the required documentation often pose a significant challenge due to a lack of sufficient administrative capacity or knowledge of the procedures.
• This situation frequently leads organizations to make their purchases in Port-au-Prince, resulting in:
• Higher transportation costs;
• Increased risks of operational delays;
• A reduction in positive economic benefits for local markets.
• Proposed Solutions: Several recommendations have been made to strengthen the capacity of the local private sector: 
• Organizing awareness-raising sessions on procurement procedures and compliance requirements for humanitarian organizations;
• Strengthening the administrative and management capacities of local suppliers;
• Highlighting the benefits of formalizing business activities for local companies;
• Involving Chambers of Commerce in supporting suppliers;
• Sharing, by organizations operating in the region, of lists of potential suppliers to facilitate their mobilization and participation in capacity-building activities.
• Given the sometimes complex relationships between certain suppliers and public institutions, it was also suggested that some sessions be organized separately to foster a more open and constructive dialogue.
• Insufficient storage capacity and lack of regional logistics hubs: Partners expressed a growing need for sustainable inventory infrastructure in the region to facilitate the prepositioning of humanitarian inventories, particularly during the hurricane season.
• To date, several organizations lack suitable space for storing their humanitarian supplies. 
• Some use facilities provided by local authorities, but these spaces do not always meet the required standards for security, protection of goods, and logistics management.
• It was also noted that, in certain operations around the world, the WFP has storage capacity that can be made available to partners through sublease arrangements. In Haiti, however, this option remains limited to ad hoc needs and temporary storage periods.
• Partners have therefore expressed the need for more sustainable solutions in the form of regional logistics hubs that are accessible over the long term, enabling:
• The prepositioning of humanitarian supplies;
• Better preparedness for emergencies;
• Shorter response times during disasters;
• Optimization of logistics costs related to transportation and storage. 

Logistics Sector Services and Access Procedures. 

• Air transport: 
• Humanitarian airlift between Panama City and Haiti (Cap-Haïtien, Port-au-Prince), coordinated by the Logistics Sector with UNHRD and UNHAS
• UNHAS special cargo flights to Port-de-Paix, Gonâve Island, Tortue Island, Belladère, and Ganthier.
• Maritime transport: Ro-ro barge service from Port-au-Prince to Miragoâne, Petite-Goâve, La Gonâve, Gonaïves, Cap-Haïtien, and Saint-Marc.
• Road transport: Humanitarian convoys from Port-au-Prince to other regions of the country (Port-de-Paix, Jérémie, Belladères, Hinche, Cap-Haïtien, ETC) 
• A CONOPS is available on the Logistics Sector website and can be accessed via this link: Haiti - Concept of Operations, November 2025 | Logistics Cluster Website. 
• All requests must be submitted online via the following link: RITA - Relief Item Tracking Application.

The date of the next subnational coordination meeting of the Logistics Sector in the South Department will be announced at a later date. 

Contacts