Haiti Independence Debt

The Haiti Independence Debt involves an 1825 agreement between Haiti and France that included France demanding an indemnity of 150 million francs to be paid by Haiti in claims over property – including Haitian slaves – that was lost through the Haitian Revolution in return for diplomatic recognition, with the debt removing $21 billion from the Haitian economy. The first annual payment alone was six times Haiti's annual revenue. The payment was later reduced to 90 million francs in 1838, equivalent to $33,875,264,271 in 2023, with Haiti paying about 112 million francs in total. Over the 122 years between 1825 and 1947, the debt severely hampered Haitian economic development as payments of capital and interest totaled a significant share of Haitian GDP, constraining the use of domestic financial funds for infrastructure and public services.

France's demand of payments in exchange for recognizing Haiti's independence was delivered to the country by several French warships in 1825, twenty-one years after Haiti's declaration of independence in 1804. Due to the unrealistic demands pushed by France, Haiti was forced to take large loans from French bank Crédit Industriel et Commercial, enriching the bank's shareholders. Though France received its last indemnity payment in 1888, the government of the United States funded the acquisition of Haiti's treasury in 1911 in order to receive interest payments related to the indemnity. In 1922, the rest of Haiti's debt to France was moved to be paid to American investors. It took until 1947 – about 122 years – for Haiti to finally pay off all the associated interest to the National City Bank of New York (now Citibank). In 2016, the Parliament of France repealed the 1825 ordinance of Charles X, though no reparations have been offered by France. These debts have been denounced by some historians and activists as responsible for Haiti's poverty today and a case of odious debt.