Pubdate: Tue, 30 Sep 2014
Source: Jerusalem Post (Israel)
Copyright: 2014 The Jerusalem Post
Contact: http://info.jpost.com/C002/Services/Feedback/editors.html
Website: http://www.jpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/516
Author: Maha El Dahan
Page: 8
Bookmark: http://mapinc.org/topic/khat

UN WARNS THAT POLITICAL CONFLICTS WORSEN YEMEN FOOD SECURITY

ABU DHABI (Reuters) - An escalation of political turmoil in Yemen, 
one of the poorest countries in the world, risks aggravating an 
already dire food security situation, the UN Food and Agriculture 
Organization said on Monday.

Shi'ite rebels seized the Yemeni capital Sanaa this month, prompting 
President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi to warn of a drift toward civil war 
in a country long riven by deep political, religious and tribal divisions.

One in four Yemenis is undernourished and more than half of Yemen's 
25 million people lack access to sufficient food for their needs, FAO 
regional coordinator Ad Spijkers told a news conference in Abu Dhabi.

With a high proportion of the population living off the land and some 
90 percent of Yemen's water resources being used in agriculture, 
people are especially vulnerable when conflicts disrupt farm 
production, FAO officials said.

"In every effort to improve food security and nutrition you need 
stability and in Yemen two thirds of the population depend on 
agriculture," said Spijkers.

"So if people are displaced and they can't grow food for their own 
families then there is a very severe situation," he said.

Compounding Yemen's plight, nearly half of its irrigation water goes 
to growing khat, a narcotic leaf that fetches a high price on local 
markets, rather than to growing staple crops.

The cash-strapped government has to import 90% of the wheat and 100% 
of the rice it needs to feed its people.

This heavy reliance on global food markets, coupled with dwindling 
foreign exchange as a result of a slump in oil exports, are now 
aggravating Yemen's food vulnerability, FAO said.

Yemen earned just $671 million from exporting crude oil from January 
to May, down nearly 40% from a year earlier, as a result of frequent 
bombings of its oil and gas pipelines, mostly by disgruntled 
tribesmen feuding with the state.

The FAO's Yemen representative, Salah Elhajj Hassan, said on Monday 
that Yemen's conflicts were hampering even the most basic aid 
programs, such as distributing agricultural inputs to farmers in rural areas.

"As we speak, we are trying to send some assistance to Jawf province 
but we have a problem doing that because of the severity of the 
situation there," he said.

As well as the violence in Sanaa, Yemen also faces regular attacks by 
al-Qaida  most recently on Sunday when a suicide bomber killed at 
least 15 people  and protests by southern separatists demanding 
secession from the country.

Instability in Yemen is a worry for the United States and its Gulf 
Arab allies because of its position next to Saudi Arabia and shipping 
lanes that run through the Gulf of Aden.

FAO has been working with international donors to help modernize 
Yemen's agricultural sector and around 40 projects have been 
identified in the past two years.

"Some of these projects have seen the light after being selected by 
various donors but the current situation in Yemen... is hampering 
progress on the ground and donors will only add more if they see 
results," said Sirelkhatim Mohamed, a FAO investment officer working 
on the issue.

Yemen's National Food Security Strategy, set up as a response to a 
spike in global food prices in 2008, aimed to cut food insecurity by 
a third by 2015 and to make 90 percent of the population food secure by 2020.

But the strategy, which included plans to set up a strategic grain 
reserve, has been severely hampered by the instability plaguing Yemen 
since street protests ousted former president Ali Abdullah Saleh in 
2011, a recent FAO report on the country said.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom