Article Information

• ARTICLE_POSTED_BY: Haiti NGOs
• ARTICLE_POSTED_ON: Feb 13, 2015
• Views : 312
• Category : Other
• Description : MAY 29, 2014
  SPOTLIGHT
  By Chiamaka Nwosu, Jeanne Batalova

Overview

• Mysterypill/Flickr
  Immigrants from Haiti represent a small but growing share of the total foreign-born population in the United States, tripling in number between 1990 and 2012. Haitian migration to the United States was very small several decades ago, with the population estimated at approximately 5,000 in 1960. Haitians began arriving in the United States in larger numbers after Haiti descended into chaos following the collapse of the Duvalier dictatorship in the late 1980s. The Haitian immigrant population stood at 606,000 in 2012, up from 200,000 in 1990; Haitians now constitute 1.5 percent of the total U.S. foreign-born population.
  
  The Haitian immigrant population in the United States is the fourth largest immigrant group from the Caribbean after immigrants from Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Jamaica. Click here to view how the number of immigrants from Haiti and other countries has changed over time.
  
  The vast majority of Haitian immigrants are in the United States, with populations also in France (77,000), Canada (74,000), and the Bahamas (40,000). Click here to see where immigrants from Haiti have settled internationally.
  
  Following the devastating earthquake in Haiti on January 12, 2010, which claimed many tens of thousands of lives (estimates vary from 46,000 to 316,000) and displaced more than 1.5 million people initially, Haiti was added by the U.S. government to the list of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) designated countries. TPS beneficiaries are temporarily granted relief from deportation and given work authorization until their TPS designation expires. For Haiti, TPS has been extended through January 22, 2016. To date, TPS has been offered to about 58,000 qualifying Haitian immigrants living in the United States. The population growth detected in the 2011 and 2012 American Community Surveys (ACS) taken by the U.S. Census Bureau would suggest that concerns that the earthquake would prompt mass emigration from the devastated country have not materialized.
  
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