More than 10 million people – almost one in two men, women and children – in Yemen are facing a looming catastrophe. Families are surviving, but only just. Food and fuel price spikes, coupled with political instability, have left Yemen’s economy in tatters.
As is often the case, ordinary people are bearing the brunt of this crisis and have exhausted their options for coping with the extreme challenges that they face. Despite a new president and a political transition process underway, the humanitarian crisis continues to deteriorate. The economy has not recovered and food prices have not come down.
In Hodeidah, where the largely rural population relies upon agriculture and fishing for livelihoods, farming output has dropped to a third of its normal production. Fishermen, those with large and small-scale farms alike, cannot afford the diesel necessary to power their engines and water pumps – even when it is available in the market. Many people lost their jobs during the political turmoil last year, at a time when food prices were skyrocketing.
Oxfam’s ECHO-funded Emergency Food Security and Livelihoods project (EFSL), created as a quick response to meet people’s inability to purchase food caused by the current crises in the country.
The project provided cash grants of $25 to families for each of three months. Those that received the payment included a diversity of vulnerable groups such as women, children, chronically-ill, disabled, elderly-headed households, and low income families
But despite the need for quick solutions like this, which meet people’s immediate needs with dignity and can build towards lasting solutions, funding for humanitarian programmes has not been flowing fast enough
Almost half of Yemenis do not have enough to eat today and Yemen is entering its hunger season. The world can bring Yemen back from the brink of catastrophe – but only if it acts now.
FATIMA MOTALA
Karachi
