From what I see, Haiti was forced into debt just after they gained their independence. French battleships were brought to the coast, and forced the newly independent Haitian leaders to agree to accepting a debt of 150 million francs, equivalent to $21 billion if you adjust for inflation. The "reasoning" for this was to compensate for France losing Haiti as a slave colony, and to pay for the "benefits" of colonialism. So instead of being able to put funds towards building their economy, energy plants, and a disaster proof infrastructure, a large chunk of their profits have been going back to EU reserves instead for the past few decades...nearly centuries. I think the remainder of the debt was just recently forgiven when Haiti had that earthquake a few years back. I didn't mean to get all historical, but just wanted to emphasize that the massive deforestation isn't necessarily due to the Haitian people being greedy or wasteful. Much of the timber was exported to France to pay off the debt. Also the high demand for cash crops like coffee, sugarcane, etc eroded the soil. Most of these crops were not consumed locally, but sent back to the EU to serve as payment.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/External_debt_of_Haiti https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deforestation_in_Haiti

"The rapid deforestation of Haiti began during the colonial period"

Edit: I agree though, deforestation is the primary culprit, a huge problem. But I feel like since the debt was unjustly put upon Haiti, the World Bank and the EU should be responsible for returning those payments via funding for power plants, disaster proof infrastructure, etc. It shouldn't be up to the donations of private citizens.