Haitians in the Diaspora sponsor an endless list of projects in their hometowns, villages and cities across Haiti. The projects run the gamut of money to support businesses, church-affiliated feeding programs, reforestation, potable water production, and school tuition gifts. There’s a whole association of such groups, numbering 50 at last count a few years ago.

Several times during the year, groups of physicians, nurses, other health workers, volunteers and their friends participate in medical missions to bring care to some of the most ignored populations en dehors. The Association of Haitian Physicians Abroad and its supporters have traveled to sugarcane plantations in the Dominican Republic, in hopes of alleviating their brethren’s physical ills.

Haitians abroad import artwork, cigarettes, therapeutic teas, and spices – the cultural staples that liven a home with the essence of Haiti – usually to support those back home that live off those products.

And last, but surely not least, Haitians abroad send a whopping $1.3 billion in remittances through money transfer agencies, on average, each year.

Given all that the community abroad gives to Haiti, in so many different ways, more often than not, they are absent at high-level initiatives held by donors. It’s a glaring absence.

It happened that way at the conference on eHealth in Bellagio, Italy, sponsored by the Rockefeller Foundation. The conference brought together hundreds of academics, public health experts, MDs and PhDs, information technology whizzes and those who hold the financing reins – all to figure out how to develop wireless networks in global south countries that would facilitate and improve healthcare delivery. It was a month long undertaking that proved productive in terms of ideas and a roadmap. It left most participants feeling inspired and ready to go out and bring healthcare to 3G status.

Nowhere in the materials, however, was the Diaspora featured. The sessions, case studies, testimonials, and speeches detailed conditions in those countries most in need and how aid agencies from the developed nations could address those needs. That middle sector – the Diaspora, from any of those countries – was not included. I’m not even sure anyone thought about that group.

In 2005, we had the largest showing of a possible partnership between the Diaspora and USAID. As the agency took is version of a traveling donor’s show on the road, hundreds of Haitian Americans packed into the Brooklyn Marriott one Saturday, for a day-long conference on what we’d have to do to be a group worth seeking out in times of crises and in the normal course of running a country perpetually in chaos. Aside from an isolated meeting in Miami a couple weeks back, where USAID sought Haitian Americans there to help it spend a $170 million on Haiti, the goal of becoming an automatic piece of the puzzle and having a seat at the table hasn’t been accomplished.

But the issue goes beyond the eHealth conference, USAID, and well-meaning but misguided benefactors in general.

It’s about what Haitians, or any country’s Diaspora, have to do to become a force that’s always present in the minds and plans of donors and benefactors. It’s not sufficient to throw up our hands and say “They know where we are, and where to find us.” Or that funders purposefully exclude Haitian Americans, Ghanaian Americans, Peruvian Americans or whoever it may be.

In this day and age, where information abounds about world financing organizations seeking entrepreneurs, development goals in practically every country on earth, philanthropy, the non-profit sector; where travel is as easy as buying a tank of gas (make that uncomfortable but necessary); where the brain trust of any poor country sitting in a developed one can find opportunities, there’s no reason more people in the Diaspora aren’t taking advantage of emerging ways to help their country – in meaningful, contemporary ways that stand better chances of success than going it alone.

At the Bellagio conference, one slogan that captured the theme of one week is this African proverb: “If you want to get there fast, go alone; if you want to get there well and rested, go together.”

Each of those choices has its merits, depending on the situation. We got together to defeat the French 204 years ago. It seems we’ve been going it alone ever since. There’s a ton of individual success stories about Haitians in Haiti and Haitians abroad making it, reaching whatever echelons they wanted with great sacrifice, sweat, blood and tears. But collectively, every one of those success stories breathes a sigh of frustration and give a shake of the head when Haiti lands on the front page of the New York Times again – showing a bony little girl standing on a mound of trash, searching for food.

In 2008 though, with Web 2.0 and 3G wireless in the palm of our hands, and cell phones in the millions in poor countries, now is the time to get together again. Of course we’ve tried it before and failed; that’s natural. And, yes, we’ve gone down this endless road before, but it bears revisiting – maybe this time with a GPS. Now, of course, we have better things to worry about, with the price of gas, layoffs in all industries and wars going on. But I hear it gets real lonely at the top.

The first generation of Haitians to leave Haiti didn’t have time or resources to help the masses, though the inclination was always there. Rightly so, it was busy providing for immediate relatives and extended family. So it went it alone. And now those Haitians are in the 60s, 70s and 80s. When they left Haiti, the dream was to return when things settled down. That dream faded, became a hope. Now it’s withered for many, and they’re in the worst places they could have ever imagined: nursing homes and New York City snow in the winter. But I digress.

My generation – those in our 20s, 30s and 40s – is savvy enough to use our expertise to benefit Haiti in a meaningful way. The hometown associations, as individual enterprises, and remittances have done their part. It’s clear the current model’s not working. We’re smart and sassy enough to seize the funds, train in capacity building, and our innate knowledge of the lay of the land to not only contribute, but drive the changes taking place in Haiti. Electronic networks are just one opportunity, for all those computer engineering and electrical engineering majors out there. I hope we’ll all look for the means in our respective fields – be it film, healthcare, dance, technology, or religion – to remain aware of and seize the opportunities that will eventually help Haiti arrive: well and rested.