GONAIVES (Haiti) - BILL Clinton on Tuesday took his Haiti relief effort to this battered seaside city that was nearly destroyed last year by a series of tropical storms, finding a mud-caked maze of partially rebuilt homes and shops.

Mr Clinton, the new special UN envoy to Haiti, viewed river control projects and visited a hospital and school that served as emergency shelters during the storms that killed nearly 800 people and caused US$1 billion (S$ in damage to irrigation, bridges and roads.

The former president praised reconstruction efforts but said much more work needed to be done. He said Haiti needs more money and better coordination among aid groups and the government to rebuild and spur development.

Aid has poured into the Gonaives region but many homes and shops remain damaged and the area remains vulnerable to flooding because the surrounding hills have been stripped of trees to create farm fields and make charcoal for cooking.

It was Mr Clinton's first trip to Gonaives but he was greeted like a returning hero. Shrieking girls clamoured to have their photo taken with the former president and men pushed their elderly mothers through the crowd for a chance to shake his hand.

Mr Clinton said the Haitian government and its international backers hope to create 150,000 to 200,000 jobs nationwide over the next two years. Many of those jobs will come from projects to rebuild roads and shore up erosion-prone hillsides.

'It will be hard, but I think it's important,' Mr Clinton said later after returning to the capital, Port-au-Prince. 'I want to try and speed up the aid and make sure to direct it toward the priorities of the Haitian people.'

He also visited a Venezuela-financed project where at least a dozen yellow backhoes and bulldozers dredged the La Quinte River, which inundated Gonaives last September like a backed-up septic tank. He examined an erosion-control terracing project that UN directors said was still only 10 per cent financed. -- AP