Haiti, the poorest country in the western hemisphere, was recovering from an ongoing cholera outbreak and a powerful earthquake in 2010, and many houses damaged during the earthquake were not rebuilt when Matthew struck. There were 25 humanitarian organizations working in impoverished Grand'Anse in southwestern Haiti before the storm made landfall. Ahead of the annual hurricane season, the World Food Programme (WFP) had pre-positioned 3,410 tons of food in the form of High Energy Biscuits, 30 tons of which were utilized immediately following the storm. Life-threatening rainfall was forecast to affect much of the nation, with accumulations averaging along the southern coast with isolated peaks up to .