Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Qatar should act immediately to prevent a famine caused by humans which is currently sweeping across their borders. On Monday the world’s leaders will gather to discuss Yemen’s future. It is reported that the United Nations is warning that nearly $4 billion dollars need to be in order to keep Yemen’s aid program overloaded. In the past, malnutrition has reached record levels. Around 50,000 people are basically being starving to death. If we don’t get a serious infusion of cash it is possible that the world will soon see a complete food shortage of historic proportions.
It was hard to imagine that things could get any worse but they did. It’s getting even worse. This year , nearly half of the country’s 30 million inhabitants will be hungry. Many thousands of children mostly only barely a few years old are suffering from severe malnutrition that their bodies are gradually becoming weak.
This is not due to an earthquake or a drought. Manmade policies and war cause this widespread hunger. We have learned from our experience in Somalia shows us that when the term of famine is applied the situation is already a disaster. The people of Yemen have been left for more than six years without adequate food and have lost many unidentified numbers and irreparably affected the development of a whole generation.
My group spoke out after that trip in the year 2017. When a warning about famine released a year later we were relieved that the international community responded quickly. The funding was quickly increased with the help of Gulf countries. The relief efforts were boosted. The aid was channeled into Yemen’s economy. The threat of famine was avoided.
Now, fast forward to 2021 and Yemen is once again being pushed to the brink. However, this time the necessary financing hasn’t materialised.The consequences of this could be measured in the lives of. 9 million of those who depend on food aid for survival receive only food rations that are half full. In the midst of a global epidemic, the supply of water for fifteen major cities has been cut in half.
The most remarkable things about this region of the globe is the way generosity to other people is considered an act of worship. In Yemen there are tens thousand of citizens have been sheltered from dying or starvation by strangers and neighbors. Farmers have offered shelter to floods of people fleeing bombs and bullets. Families have offered clothing and food and thousands of Yemenis have offered their homes to people in dire need.
