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After six years of war, what is happening in Yemen?
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Date: None

Two months ago, with the war in Yemen entering its seventh year, the UN secretary general, in his appeal to funders at the annual pledging conference, reminded everyone that “More than 16 million people [in the country] are expected to go hungry this year. Nearly 50,000 Yemenis are already starving to death in famine-like conditions. The worst hunger is in areas affected by the conflict.”

Yemen today has a population of 30 million people, with three million currently displaced. They are either hosted by relatives or in camps and informal settlements where they are dependent on humanitarian supplies since there is no employment and they are far from their lands. Another million have returned home after various periods of displacement.

More than 70% of Yemenis live in rural areas, and half of them depend heavily on agriculturally related activities. But the war has also encouraged many urban people to return to their villages.

So, why are people dying of hunger?

Yemen’s agriculture has for decades been unable to feed its population, which explains why Yemenis migrated to the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states – Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates – and earlier to the UK, US, South-East Asia and East Africa.

The situation in Yemen worsened significantly in the past three decades due to the water crisis, as well as other aspects of global warming, neo-liberal development policies and rapid population growth. In 1990, when the Republic of Yemen was established, it had 11 million people.

These factors have reduced the country’s self-sufficiency in grains (sorghum, maize, millet and wheat) to, at best 30%, with full self-sufficiency only for poultry, fruit and vegetables. Thus, the country depends on imports for 90% of its food, including staples such as wheat, rice, sugar, or tea.

Prior to the war, almost half of Yemenis were living in poverty, a figure which has now risen to more than 80% as a result of the collapse of the economy since the full-scale war started in 2015.

In 2014, the World Food Programme assessed that more than 40% of the population was food insecure, an 'UN-speak' euphemism for hunger. So given this situation and six years of war, it is little surprise that in 2021, the number rose to 54%.

Shrinking aid

A few hours after his appeal to funders, António Guterres, the UN secretary general, expressed ‘disappointment’ at the low level of pledges, a mere $1.7bn, less than half the $3.8bn called for.

In March 2021, it was announced that the UK had reduced its contribution to Yemen by 60%, leading to widespread outrage at home given the expected impact of the cuts in worsening Yemenis’ living conditions.

In 2020, the UN appeal achieved less than 50% of the amount requested, by comparison with 87% of the far higher amount sought in 2019. The significantly reduced contributions of Saudi Arabia and the complete absence of any from the UAE in 2020 explain this: the two nations had financed more than half the amount received in 2019.

While there are political reasons for Saudi Arabia and the UAE’s reductions, the amounts they have contributed in the past are mere fractions of the sums they spend on advanced weaponry used in Yemen, causing widespread death and destruction.

[1] Url: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/north-africa-west-asia/after-six-years-war-what-happening-yemen/