17 Million Yemenis Food Insecure under Saudi Siege

Based on a new report by the UN agencies two years of Saudi-led war and destruction has left more than two third of the country's population food insecure as many are in need of emergency food aids. This is while Saudi regime holds tight on its embargo on its southern neighbor and recently prevented a wheat carrying ship from anchoring in Yemeni ports.
 
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), and the World Food Programme (WFP) said in a joint statement on Friday that the number of food insecure people in Yemen had risen by three million during the past seven months, reaching an estimated 17.1 million people and exceeding two-thirds of the entire population of 27.4 million.
 
The three UN agencies that are working with Yemeni government to fight the problem also warned about the unprecedented levels of hunger across the country, saying that about 7.3 million of the affected people were considered to be in need of emergency food assistance.
 
"The speed at which the situation is deteriorating and the huge jump in food insecure people is extremely worrying,” cautioned FAO’s representative in Yemen, Salah Hajj Hassan.
 
According to the assessment, the rates of acute malnutrition are found to have crossed the “critical” threshold in at least four provinces of Abyan, Hudaydah, Hadhramaut and Taizz, while agricultural production, as the “main source” of livelihood for the majority of the population, is falling across the country.
 
WFP Country Director Stephen Anderson also raised the alarm, saying the current level of hunger in the impoverished country was unprecedented, “which is translating into severe hardship and negative humanitarian consequences for millions of Yemenis, particularly affecting vulnerable groups".
 
Saudi Arabia has been engaged in the deadly campaign since March 2015 in an attempt to reinstate Yemen’s resigned president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, a staunch ally of Riyadh.
 
The Saudi war has so far claimed the lives of at least 11,400 Yemenis, and taken a heavy toll on the country’s facilities and infrastructure, destroying many hospitals, schools, and factories.