Technical missions from the Dominican Republic are studying the case of channeling of the border rivers. The missions are meeting after the impasse over the construction of a canal that would divert the waters of the Masacre River in Haiti. The river is born in the Dominican Republic and then flows into Haiti.
The Dominican Institute for Hydraulic Resources (Indrhi) opinion is that the use by Haiti of the waters that originate in the Dominican Republic will not affect farmers in the Dominican Republic. Indrhi technicians say the canal under construction in Haiti would use only 20.33% of the yearly average water flow of the Masacre to irrigate 3,000 hectares of farmland. The document says that the Dajabón farmers make use of 70% of the waters before the river enters Haiti.
The working group met last Thursday, 27 May 2021. President Luis Abinader said that the technicians would be meeting again to decide the issue.
President Abinader announced on Saturday, 29 May 2021 when visiting Jarabacoa, that his government will present the possible construction of a dam on the Artibonito River to the technician discussion Group. This large project has been in the planning stages for years.
What is the importance of this? The Artibonito is the only major river in Haiti and its watershed is entirely within the Dominican Republic’s Central Mountains. This gives the Dominican Republic a very powerful tool in any discussions regarding water and the Massacre river.
Geologist Osiris León had written in an article in El Caribe on 10 May 2021 that the Dominican government over the past 25 years years has sought to build four dams to better channel the waters of the Artibonito but has not done so because the Haitian authorities argue that it would affect their only dam on the Artibonito, the Peligre.
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El Dia
30 May 2021