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Next to him is a small cardboard box with several banknotes worth 10 Haitian gourdes — about 7 U.S. cents.

Education had been assigned a mere 15,816 gourdes — less than 1 percent of the budget.

"With 500 gourdes per day, without any government subsidies, we cannot meet our needs while the price of basic goods, transport costs have increased," said St Eloi, coordinator for the National Union of Haitian Workers.

About 50 Haitians managed to raise 25,000 gourdes — about $250 — for a spot on his battered wooden boat, parts of which were rotting.

Opposition-backed protests against the government dragged Haiti into recession in 2019 before the coronavirus pandemic even hit, and a steady deprecation in the gourde currency has put pressure on businesses heavily reliant on foreign imports.