Delivering a lifeline for Haiti

Connexion Haiti was the BBC’s lifeline radio programme to earthquake-stricken Haiti.

The first BBC programme in Creole, it provided emergency advice and information on public health and aid to Haitians struggling to deal with the effects of the disaster, which killed as many as 200,000 people.

Lisa Robinson, Senior Project Manager, Humanitarian, at the BBC World Service Trust, was with the team in Miami then Port-au-Prince.

The BBC World Service Trust (BBC WST) has delivered humanitarian programming for years – from Afghanistan to Darfur, from Somalia to Burma. I was thrilled to be able to bring this experience to the BBC’s new Creole Service.

The earthquake had seriously disrupted the country's communication system, leaving millions of Haitians without crucial information about aid efforts.

Local radio stations were doing their best to get news bulletins on air and report on the catastrophe. Radio has always been the most popular form of media in Haiti, the poorest country in the Americas.

The aim of Connexion Haiti was to provide as much up-to-the-minute information as possible about where people could find food aid, clean water, medical assistance and shelter. We pulled together that information from, among other sources, our partner organisations, a BBC reporter in Port-au-Prince, and the main aid agencies.

Initially the team – which included producers and editors Nick Miles, Henri Astier and Emilio San Pedro – was based in Miami, and there I worked with my colleagues on best practices for lifeline radio. I helped set the tone for the programme and provided editorial input throughout, ensuring the programme delivered useful, public information, not just news about what happened.

I suggested humanitarian angles to stories and reiterated that this wasn't a news programme.

For example, when a boy and his mother were reunited through the programme, we went further than just reporting the story. We informed audiences – many of whom were desperate to find their own missing relatives – that the Red Cross operates a missing persons service and provided information on how to access it.

Ensuring that lifeline programming reflects local voices and experiences is crucial to meeting the psychosocial needs of traumatised listeners. We couldn't do this effectively producing the whole programme from Miami. The lone stringer in Haiti was on his way to the Dominican Republic to meet his wife and the US phone number we had for audience interaction was likely too expensive and complicated for ordinary listeners to use.

With the small budget I had from the BBC WST, I prioritised a trip to Haiti for Nick Miles and myself. Once there, we recruited Andy Limontas, an experienced local reporter who was well connected with community groups and identified with audience needs. (He was sleeping rough in front of his damaged house).

Nick did a superb job of boosting Andy's skills through intensive training, which was literally hands-on at times! Together, they produced fantastic pieces with practical information listeners could apply to improve their lives.

We also made a point of getting closer to the audience by gathering passers-by during a broadcast, soliciting input afterwards. Far from scientific research, it was still useful given our four-day limit.

We arranged a local cell-phone number straight away and watched the texts roll in after it went on air.

The rest of my time there was spent with the organisations we regularly partner with to make BBC WST lifeline programming elsewhere in the world. I met with aid agencies who could help us prioritise the issues we needed to cover in Haiti.

I talked with other media development organisations to find ways to complement each other's work. For example, we arranged to share content with Internews and cross-promote the programmes. Thomson Reuters Foundation advertised our broadcast times, frequencies, and interactive details on their Emergency Information Service which reached thousands of subscribers by text.

The BBC World Service Trust collaborated with Internews, UN OCHA and other agencies to deliver coordinated information to audiences in Haiti.