José Graziano da Silva, Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), reported that agricultural production and cultivated areas in Yemen declined 38 per cent due to lack of inputs and investments and a 35 per cent reduction in livestock production, last year.
 
"There can be no delay in providing agricultural assistance during humanitarian crises, and we must seize every opportunity to support communities in Yemen to continue to produce food, even in difficult circumstances," he said in a report published on the FAO website.

"Providing a mix of food assistance and food aid is the only way to avoid famine in conflict-ridden Yemen where two-thirds of the population - 17 million people - are suffering from severe food insecurity, , FAO Director-General José Graziano said.
 
He added that more than 17 million people around Yemen’s rugged landscape are acutely food insecure, and the figure is likely to increase as the ongoing conflict continues to erode the ability to grow, import, distribute and pay for food.

He pointed out the efforts of the organization on the ground in Yemen, which is working continuously and in cooperation with a number of partners to deliver emergency assistance to secure livelihoods to start the process of food production.
 
Since the beginning of the year, FAO has reached 300,000 people through a range of interventions aimed at enabling them to produce nutritious food for their families and sell it as well, with some two million Yemeni families in need of emergency agricultural support.

"The organization is also working to support the efforts to revitalize the livestock sector, which is very important as a source of food and livelihood for many people in Yemen, he said, adding that FAO is seeking to provide vaccines or treatments for more than 8 million livestock this year.

Da Silva stressed that these home production kits constitute cost-effective humanitarian assistance that can be scaled up to reach more people more quickly. This is especially pertinent for internally displaced people – who now constitute more than 10 percent of the population, and the vast majority of whom traditionally relied on agriculture and livestock, he added.