LONDON, (Reuters) – The United States and the  Dominican Republic could help Haiti recover from last month’s earthquake by employing Haitian workers to fill seasonal labour  gaps, a senior U.N. official said yesterday.

“More than the immediate support…in the form of money and  some technical capacity, the big issue really also is finding  some longer-term trade and employment solutions,” said Salil  Shetty, director of the United Nations’ Millennium Cam-paign,  which aims to eradicate extreme poverty by 2015.

He cited the example of a New Zealand scheme which makes it  easier for employers in some industries to recruit temporary  workers from abroad.

“There’s no reason why the southeastern part of the U.S. or  even the Dominican Republic can’t do this sort of system in a  structured and legalised way because there is a shortage of  labour (there),” he told Reuters in a telephone interview.

Even before the Jan. 12 earthquake, which killed more than  200,000 people, Haiti was heavily dependent on money earned by  its workers abroad. In 2008 it received $1.9 billion in  remittances, an amount equal to 16 percent of its gross domestic  product, according to the Inter-American Development Bank.

The U.S. government has already decided to allow up to  200,000 Haitians who were in the United States when the  earthquake struck to stay. They will be allowed to work for up  to 18 months to send remittances to Haiti in what the United  States says is a form of indirect economic aid.

The international community should help the Dominican  Republic — by providing financial and technological aid and  trade opportunities — absorb more Haitian workers “in a  systematic and structured way”, Shetty said.

An estimated one million Haitians, mostly illegal  immigrants, work in the Dominican Republic which shares the same  island with far poorer Haiti.

“The Dominican Republic already has better economic  opportunities and has the capacity to expand economic  opportunities,” Shetty said.