Petit Goâve is 68 kilometers southwest of Port-au-Prince and was one of the hardest hit areas by the January 12th, 2010 earthquake. Much of the region is mountainous and experiences severe riverine flooding. I served as a pro-bono environmental planner for a project in ︎︎︎Petit Goâve, Haiti for four years. The project was spearheaded by Community2Community (C2C), a Haitian-led non-profit service organization founded after the earthquake, and a local farming organization in Petit Goâve. The project was focused on the 12th Section of Petit Goâve, Piton Vallue. To develop the scope of the rehabilitation project, first we needed to understand the boundaries of Piton Vallue.

Piton Vallue, like many areas of Haiti, did not have robust mapping data on the neighborhood level. Locals knew community boundaries through the lived experience of walking through Piton Vallue. The Pinchina Consulting group in partnership with the local farming organization developed a community mapping initiative where community members were given GPS devices and walked the boundaries of their neighborhoods as they understood them. The process along with a series of community conversations revealed that Piton Vallue was one of many communities in the 12th Section of Petit Goâve. Learn more about Pinchina’s work here.