Press Releases

Haiti Economic Losses Could Reach $12 Billion

BATON ROUGE, LA, January 25, 2010 ─ IEM, an international provider of risk management services, estimates the death toll from the January 12, 2010 earthquake in Haiti at 173,000 to 207,000.  IEM’s analyses suggest a level of destruction and loss of life on the scale of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, which killed over 200,000 people across 15 countries. The total population for the four countries most affected by the tsunami was over 1.3 billion. Haiti’s population is 8.8 million.

Property damage costs are estimated initially at $6 to $9 billion, and business losses at $2 to $3 billion in the first year alone. These losses are mostly uninsured losses, as insurance penetration in Haiti is very low. IEM’s business loss estimates suggest that Haiti’s GDP in 2010 will fall by more than 40% from 2009’s production level of $6.9 billion.  

According to IEM economist Dr. Lloyd Blanchard, “The ultimate economic damages will exceed the value of Haiti’s annual production as well as the actual value of the destruction for two reasons. First, the value of the property damages will likely be surpassed by the value of the reconstructed property. Second, business interruption losses will be substantial, and economic recovery will be a multi-year process.”

IEM has provided risk management services to more than 150 federal, state, and local governments and organizations in the US and abroad. With 25 years of experience in disaster management, the company has calculated similar estimates for other disasters, most recently for the 2008 Hurricanes Gustav and Ike. IEM’s professional emergency management staff is currently supporting the Haiti disaster response through contractual logistics support to FEMA.

Please visit our website (http://www.iem.com) for continuing updates and analyses on the crisis in Haiti.

Dr.  Blanchard is a former Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Associate Director who oversaw close to $200 billion of federal program budgets. He helped implement the Performance Assessment Rating Tool (PART) and other performance management efforts for many federal agencies, including the Treasury Department, Housing and Urban Development, Federal Emergency Management Agency, Department of Transportation, Department of Justice, and General Services Administration.

Dr. Blanchard served as the Deputy Chief Financial Officer for Policy at NASA, where he led the space agency’s effort to become the first federal agency to achieve success in performance budgeting reform. Prior to joining NASA, he served as Chief Operating Officer of the Small Business Administration, where he oversaw national operations and led the agency’s transformation initiative.  

During his academic career, Dr. Blanchard taught at Syracuse University, the University of Washington, and LSU.  Dr. Blanchard has published a number of scholarly articles on performance budgeting and education finance, and is a regular speaker for the National League of Cities’ Leadership Training Institute, where he translates research findings on economic development and performance management into prescriptive strategies for local officials.  

Dr. Blanchard holds a Ph.D. in Public Administration, a Masters in Public Administration, and Bachelor degrees in political science and in economics.