Category: In-depth Investigations

To understand the mass emmigration of the Honduran people, we must review the last decade of this country: a coup d’état, a looted and poor

As detained former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández faces extradition to the United States on three drug trafficking charges, this investigation examines a group of his relatives and friends, who have been partners for years in a maze of charities and companies in Honduras and Florida, multiple of which have no apparent business activity. The paper trail also leads to Panama. The associates – including the current Honduran ambassadors to Mexico and the Dominican Republic, a nephew of the former president, and a former financial consultant to the congress – told us that their ventures didn’t succeed due to a decade-old scandal involving one of their charities, Fundecima.

The communities in the Dry Corridor of southern Honduras mostly work in the “Coyolito Club” industries: shrimp, sugar cane and melon farming. Companies in these three industries are often the only source of work, but have been accused of human and labor rights violations. They may also be contributing to the environmental deterioration of a region abandoned by its government. All of these factors are driving migrants to flee their homeland.

The Youths Building the Future program was launched two and half years ago, and now nearly 4,000 Honduran youths are working at 130 companies in jobs funded by a Mexican government program. They are paid a stipend that is half the minimum wage in Honduras. Despite its slow implementation, Mexican President Andres Lopez Obrador is urging the United States to adopt and fund this model as an incentive for Central American young people to stay home instead of migrating north.

In the midst of the pandemic and as the November elections approach, Employment and Economic Development Zones (Zonas de Empleo y Desarrollo Económico – ZEDE)

Delta Apparel, a transnational clothing manufacturer, dismissed 430 workers during the pandemic. Many of them had work-related musculoskeletal conditions. Thousands more were furloughed without pay. The Ministry of Labor shut down for six months amid widespread labor abuses.

The Honduran government has promised that the construction of 14 dams will prevent the severe flooding that the country experienced during tropical storms Eta and

One of the pandemic relief measures taken by the government of Honduras was to secure up to US$2.5 billion in debt to be used for guaranteed loans channeled through a government bank to small and medium-size enterprises. Despite the government’s promises of relief for small businesses, our investigation found that this money has mostly benefited private banks, business conglomerates, and medium-size companies. There has been almost no official relief for microenterprises.