Electricity

Ever since the internationally recognized government fled from Sana’a after the Houthi takeover in 2014, it has failed to develop a strategy to adapt to its new environment and the challenges it poses. Instead, it has continued to act as if nothing has happened, and only a few tweaks are required to keep going. This can be seen clearly in…

The year-long Houthi (Ansar Allah) campaign of military attacks on Red Sea shipping came to a halt on January 19, following news of a ceasefire agreement in Gaza. Houthi leader Abdelmalek al-Houthi announced a conditional suspension of the attacks on US- and UK-affiliated shipping as long as Western airstrikes in Yemen ceased. However, the group said Israeli-linked vessels would still…

The first quarter of 2025 saw escalating US sanctions against the Houthis. The sanctions, intended to suffocate the Houthis financially, could have a negative impact on Yemen’s already fragile financial system, and threaten to disrupt flows of crucial humanitarian aid and remittances, further destabilizing the economy. In mid-January, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC)…

Yemen is experiencing a severe economic downturn as it tries to navigate long-term fiscal challenges. A World Bank report on Fiscal Vulnerabilities in Low-Income Countries released in late November highlighted Yemen’s dire fiscal situation as among the worst in the world. The World Bank’s Yemen Monitor for Spring 2024 noted that the current crisis is caused by plummeting oil and…

Away from the Red Sea crisis that dominated the headlines of 2024, the space for female political and social actors in Yemen has continued to shrink, largely unchecked. Today, the distinction between the repression in areas controlled by the Houthis and those under the internationally recognized government is becoming increasingly blurred. In Houthi-controlled areas, a campaign of terrifying arrests of…

Members of the muhammasheen community remain among the most vulnerable victims of systemic injustice and suffering in Yemen, a situation made worse by the war. Ostracized and disparaged, the community’s women and girls (muhammashat) are particularly vulnerable. The nature of their work, which commonly entails begging, street-sweeping, and vending, brings them into public spaces, putting them at risk of exploitation,…

For decades, Yemen’s higher education system has been characterized by a persistent mismatch between graduates’ skills and the changing requirements of the market. The last labor force survey carried out in 2014 showed that less than one-third of Yemen’s labor force had secondary or tertiary education, and a qualification mismatch was found among some 83 percent of the employed population.…

A political crisis has wracked the interim capital of Aden as the internationally recognized government struggles to deal with the plummeting Yemeni rial. The currency now trades at over YR2,000 to the dollar, having lost over a third of its value since the year began. Riven by political infighting and lacking the vision or tools to arrest the slide, an…

This study examines the key barriers and opportunities regarding localizing humanitarian aid in Yemen. The findings reveal a significant gap between the international community’s intent to localize aid and the reality on the ground. Challenges include Yemen’s fragmented political landscape, weak governance, and a limited understanding of what localization entails. Further, the lack of sustained investment in local organizations, especially…