@FAO - FAO Director-General with the Yemeni Prime Minister

25 April 2017, Geneva – FAO Director-General Jose Graziano da Silva today met Yemen’s Prime Minister Ahmed ben Dagher, for talks on FAO’s support to the country to deliver emergency livelihood assistance and kick-start food production, especially when resources pledged to tackle the crisis are concretely made available.

The meeting took place at a United Nations High-Level Pledging conference for Yemen where FAO’s Director-General stressed that an integrated combination of food assistance and food production assistance is the only way to avoid famine in conflict-ridden Yemen, where two-thirds of the population - 17 million people - are currently suffering from severe food insecurity and more than 2 million children are suffering acute malnutrition.

Pledges made by 48 UN Member States, the European Commission, the Central Emergency Response Fund and four NGO/humanitarian organizations for humanitarian action in Yemen rose to nearly US$ 1.1 billion. 

At the meeting, FAO Director-General emphasized that agriculture must be an integral part of the humanitarian response in Yemen.  He stressed that FAO, the World Food Program and other members of the food security and agriculture cluster have the ability to confront the hunger crisis in Yemen. “We have the expertise and the required capacities but we need an immediate and substantial increase in resources from donors in order to save lives and livelihoods for the future,” he said.

FAO Director-General invited Prime Minister ben Dagher to attend FAO’s Conference in July as an opportunity to raise awareness of Yemen’s needs among other member countries.

FAO’s work in the country

During his address to the conference, Graziano da Silva noted how FAO "is on the ground" in Yemen, constantly working, together with its partners, to deliver emergency livelihood assistance to kick-start food production.

Crop and livestock output fell by nearly 40 percent in 2016 and many households engaged in agriculture lack access to essential farm inputs.

So far this year, FAO has reached almost 300 000 people through a combination of interventions that enable them to produce nutritious food for their families and for sale. Almost 2 million households are in need of emergency agricultural support in Yemen.

FAO is also supporting efforts to revive livestock production, which is critical as a source of food and livelihoods for many people in Yemen. The agency is aiming to vaccinate or treat over 8 million animals in 2017.

Yemen had urgent needs to develop its agricultural sector even before the conflict intensified in 2015, since which time household incomes have languished or disappeared and large-scale food imports have become hard to maintain.

Although only a small share of food is produced domestically, nearly two-thirds of Yemenis derive their livelihoods from agriculture. Before the current escalation of conflict, Yemen was in dire need of strengthening its agriculture sector. With the deterioration of the security situation, FAO is increasing its effort to support local food productionand to protect the livelihoods of highly vulnerable rural populations.