The United States should increase aid to Yemen to prevent the poor Arab country becoming a failed state, research house Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said. “It is essential that Washington take a holistic approach to Yemen,” Carnegie told the US Congress. It is in Washington's interests to engage Yemen on other issues that will contribute indirectly to improving domestic security,” Carnegie's Christopher Boucek said in written testimony. Yemen is under severe economic pressure as gas exports cannot offset dwindling oil reserves, while its population of 23 million, of which some 40 percent live on less than $2 a day, is set to double within 10 years. Carnegie said greater aid to Yemen would “help prevent state failure, as well as offset the difficult economic choices that need to be made in Yemen as it prepares to transition to a post-oil economy”. Sana'a increased fuel prices by up to 14 percent this week to ease the budget of $2 billion for diesel subsidies this year - the equivalent what Yemen earned from oil exports in 2009. The United States should also help Yemen enforce a stricter legal regime to stop an excessive use of water as reservoirs deplete in several parts of the huge country, the group said. Yemen should be encouraged to start importing qat from East Africa as a significant part of its water consumption is currently used to irrigate qat. “So much land is being used for qat cultivation that the country is now a net food importer,” Carnegie said, adding that Yemeni farmers should shift to growing cereals and other foodstuffs. Donors pledged some $4.7 billion in aid at a conference in London in 2006 but much of the money has not been spent yet as the country did not have the capacities to absorb such sums.
