Some 17 million people in Yemen, 60 percent of the population, “are now facing hunger,” due to armed conflict and a rapid rise in food insecurity since last summer, said the UN Food and Agriculture Organization. “Without additional humanitarian and livelihoods support, Taiz and Al Hudaydah, two governorates accounting for almost a quarter of Yemen’s population, risk slipping into famine.”
Yemen is one of four countries at risk of famine this year, says a food monitoring network, FEWS NET. The others are South Sudan, Somalia and Nigeria.
Yemen is currently “one of the worst hunger crises in the world,” said FAO. Its representative in the country says that armed conflict has significantly reduced crop and livestock production, devastating agricultural families. Food and fuel prices are rising and jobs are scarce. “Across Yemen as many as 2 million households engaged in agriculture now lack access to critical agricultural inputs, including seeds, fertilizer and fuel for irrigation pumps. High fuel prices also make irrigation prohibitively expensive,” said FAO.