Yemen Appeal

As the conflict in Yemen reaches its tenth year in 2025, the humanitarian needs in Yemen are not abating, with 18.2 million people, including 9.8 million children, urgently requiring assistance. Despite international efforts, the lack of a political solution to Yemen's crisis is worsening the situation for the population. With 4.5 million people displaced and millions more affected by the conflict, the toll on the population is steadily increasing. Meanwhile, the impacts of climate change, including flooding, droughts and recurrent outbreaks of such diseases as cholera, are adding to the difficulties of children and families. 

Socioeconomic conditions in Yemen deteriorated in 2023–2024 due to declining remittances, coupled with trade disruptions, fuel shortages, high inflation, the banking sector crisis and reduced humanitarian aid. The World Bank estimates Yemen’s real gross domestic product will shrink by 1 per cent in 2024, after a 2 per cent decline in 2023. The economy has contracted by a cumulative 54 per cent since 2015, leaving most Yemenis living in extreme poverty.  

Currently, 17 million people are food insecure, 4.7 million of them at crisis levels. Despite projection to treat 100 per cent of the planned 556,000 children with severe wasting in 2024, an additional 483,000 children are expected to require treatment in 2025. The survival of Yemen’s children is at stake, with large-scale interventions urgently needed. 

About 17.8 million people (51 per cent children) in Yemen lack adequate health care. Despite UNICEF’s efforts in 2024, many health facilities remain non-functional. By October 2024, Yemen faced 19,979 cases of measles and rubella, with 183 deaths. Additionally, 186,000 suspected cholera cases and 680 deaths were reported across 22 governorates in 2024, with children under age 5 representing 16 percent of cases and 18 percent of deaths. Vaccination efforts are severely hampered due to misiniformation, particularly in the north. Yemen is home to 580,000 zero-dose children, or 35 per cent of all zero-dose children in the Middle East and North Africa region. Furthermore, 17.4 million people in Yemen lack access to safe water, sanitation and hygiene services, leaving many children vulnerable to cholera and other waterborne diseases.

The protection crisis is alarming, with negative coping mechanisms like child marriage, child labour, gender-based violence, recruitment by armed groups and mental health issues still common. About 7.4 million children, including those with disabilities, need protection services. Around 6.2 million children require educational support, with 1 in 4 children out of school, and there a 44 per cent school drop-out rate, linked to child labour. Since 2015, at least 2,424 schools have been destroyed, and nearly 200,000 teachers’ salaries have gone unpaid since 2023, severely affecting the quality of education.

In 2025, UNICEF will deliver life-saving, protective and multisectoral interventions, guided by the Core Commitments for Children in Humanitarian Action and by international human rights law. Aligned with inter-agency planning processes, UNICEF leads the WASH, Nutrition, and Child Protection Area of Responsibility clusters and co-leads the Education Cluster, addressing the urgent needs of populations affected by conflict, climate change and disease outbreaks. Working with the government and with national and international non-governmental organizations, UNICEF will strengthen localization, promote gender-responsive programming, ensure child safeguarding and foster inter-cluster coordination for an efficient life-saving response. 

UNICEF's health response aims to enhance primary health care andexpand vaccination coverage, ensuring vulnerable children access essential services. UNICEF will also work to protect children and their families from public health emergencies, helping to prevent and control disease outbreaks and other public health emergencies, including cholera, other waterborne diseases and respiratory illnesses. UNICEF will treat severe wasting, provide micronutrient supplementation for children and support maternal health with iron and folic acid supplements. Preventive initiatives will promote healthy nutrition, breastfeeding and maternal awareness. Parents will receive counseling on infant feeding and child spacing, and UNICEF will support treatment for malnourished children. UNICEF’s WASH interventions will integrate with those for health and nutrition, focusing on safe water, hygiene promotion and gender-sensitive facilities in camps for internally displaced persons.

UNICEF will expand access to learning, particularly for girls, by improving safe learning environments, providing learning materials and supporting accelerated learning programmes. Cash assistance will help improve school attendance. Focus will be on professionalizing and incentivizing teachers, especially rural female teachers, who are crucial for girls' education. UNICEF’s child protection programme will focus on mental health and psychosocial support and collaboration with other sectors, including education and health. It will work with social workers and the Ministry of Social Affairs and Labour to support children requiring specialized services. Child protection will also emphasize explosive ordnance risk education to reduce risks to children from unexploded devices. 

UNICEF will expand its 'cash plus' social protection programme, offering financial support to vulnerable families, families with children with disabilities and those referred throughcase management in nutrition and education. UNICEF will also develop a national public finance for children strategy to advocate for increased public investment in children amid declining external funding. 

UNICEF will enhance preparedness capacity through risk analysis, contingency planning and supply pre-positioning for emergencies, ensuring anticipatory, multisectoral action, with a focus on community engagement and accountability.