Interview with William Cinea
A fellow alum of Cornell University, William Cinea is an entrepreneur, conservationist, and avid botanic researcher in Haiti. His passion for the environment inspired him to pursue a degree in Forestry from the Dominican Republic, a master's degree in Biodiversity at the State University of Haiti, an international degree in Management of Botanical Gardens in London, and a specialization in Natural Resources Management from Cornell. His diversity in international education has allowed him to develop the Jardin Botanique de Cayes and Nature Design; two of the first institutions to showcase biodiversity in the country. As the founder and first director of these institutions, William is able to share his expertise in tropical botanical systems and put Haiti on the map as a country with unique and complex biodiversity worth seeing. After visiting William’s projects, we sat down to discuss his role as an environmental entrepreneur in Haiti and how his experiences compare to the outside perceptions of the country as a whole.
INTERVIEW
What inspired you to start Jardine Botanique des Cayes and Nature Design?
I first studied forestry in the Dominican Republic. When I was there, I got inspired and made the decision to be involved in Haiti reforestation. When I graduated in June 2000, I created an organization called “Green Haiti” to develop programs and projects in reforestation. Then in 2003, I had the opportunity to attend a course in Israel on Agribusiness and I visited the Haifa Garden. I was really impressed by its beauty and I said- if they can do it we can do the same in Haiti - because we have more water and plant diversity than them. So when I went back to Haiti, I rented 8 hectares of land to establish Cayes Botanical Garden. At first, my goal was to establish a well-designed French garden without any vision of conservation. In 2009, I attend a training course at the Kew Garden and in 2010 received a scholarship to study natural resources management at Cornell University. During my study, I met some great leaders in the public garden management field who provided a real sense of what I was doing and envisioned for Cayes Botanical Garden. When I came back to Haiti in 2012, we decided to develop a master plan to transform Cayes Botanical Garden into a real botanical garden. With this new vision and goals, we became the main center for environmental education, research, conservation and horticulture in Haiti. Today the garden is one of the best accomplishments and lot of Haitians are very proud of it.
The idea of Nature Design Haiti came from the vision to create other environmental institutions in Haiti, specifically not operated by an NGO. Our main goal was to help the country create and manage botanical gardens, protected areas, arboretums, conservatories, zoos ect. Our actions are mainly focused on improving landscape reforestation and restoration. We use science and art to address environmental issues in Haiti.
What are your goals as an entrepreneur in the environmental/ conservation field?
I have 17 years of work experience in Haiti in the environmental field. As an entrepreneur, I am working to establish environmental institutions in Haiti without the NGO dictation. I am working hard to establish a management system that self-sustains with the backbone of an entrepreneurial spirit. I have had the privilege to meet and learn from great scientists and entrepreneurs worldwide, and have made it a personal obligation to help Haiti work towards a new direction through science and entrepreneurship. By combining science and entrepreneurship, I have three main goals:
1. To be involved in data collection to create a database for biodiversity and conservation.
2. To contribute to Haitian environmental education for conservation.
3. To participate in ecosystem restoration in Haiti in order to build resilience for the country against climate change and natural disasters.
What do you want people to know about Haiti that is often not portrayed in the media?
We are a country with great history that symbolizes hard work and resilience. Based on our fight for freedom, a lot of our resources were impacted and are affected time and time again due to natural disasters. On the island alone, we have 5,000 native plants, with 41% being endemic (only found in the island). This offers a very unique collection of plants that are resilient in this climate and cater to the diversity of fauna in the region. Our biggest challenge is the lack of environmental education at all levels in society. As a French-speaking country, we can debate and make plans but few actions are taken. The other challenge is the huge number of NGO’s in the country. Personally, I feel that these NGO’s have money to spend without the true desire to help the country, or at least the local knowledge of society and culture. The third challenge is our geographical position, every year we anticipate hurricanes that can destroy any project we become involved in. Lastly, the fourth challenge is the political issue that prevents us from thinking and advancing towards the future.
How do you see the future of environmental conservation and ecology on the island as a whole?
For Haiti, the future of environmental conservation is uncertain. The degradation is so high and we are wondering, how many years of environmental education and action will it take to change the situation? For the island, we have tremendous trouble focused on production beyond 200 years. In the past, we destroyed a lot of ecosystems for agriculture and forestry. Then, as we worked towards reforestation and regeneration, the majority of the species used were exotic and had no connection to local fauna or soil conditions. Some of these species went on to become invasive, like Azadirachta indicates and Leucaena leucocephala, which can now be seen everywhere. On both sides of the island, we eliminated a large portion of our native and endemic species. Ultimately, making the island very vulnerable. Overall, we need to work together and take action towards the conservation of the native and endemic flora we share that makes this island unique and environmentally iconic.
+ You can follow William's work in the links below
