The official name of Yemen is the Republic of Yemen and Sana’a is its capital. Other main cities are Aden, al-Hodiedah, Mukalla and Taiz. Islam is the religion of the State, and Arabic the official language. A majority of its population are of Arabian origin with a minority from Africa, India, and Europe.
LOCATION
The country is located in the south of the Arabian Peninsula or to be more precise in the southwest of Asia. The total area of Yemen is 530000 square km. From north to south, at its widest extent, Yemen is nearly 565 km long, and longest extent from east to west is about 1,100 km long. To its north is Saudi Arabia and on its eastern border is Oman. In southwest the Gulf of Aden separates it from Djibouti and Somalia and in the west the Red Sea is between Eritrea and Yemen. Its southeastern coastline is formed by the Arabian Sea. Yemen also includes the Island of Socotra, which is about 1,000 km to east of Aden in the Indian Ocean, and the Kamaran group, located in the Red Sea
POPULATION
According to the final results of the general census for the year 2004, the population of the Republic of Yemen is 19,685,161 of which the male population constitutes 10,036,953 or 50.99 per cent and the female population constitutes 9,648,208 or 49.01 per cent. The population is growing at a rate of 3.0 per cent per annum. The fertility rate for women is 6.2 per cent. Mortality rate for infants of less than a year age is 74.8 per 1000 births. The average life expectancy at birth is 62.9 years. Average number of persons per family is7.14 and average number of persons per dwelling is 6.9.
POLITICAL SYSTEM
Yemen is a democratic republic and sovereignty lies with the citizens of the country, who exercise their right to franchise and elect their representatives directly through referendum and general election. As such the citizens practise power indirectly through the legislative, executive or judicial authorities or through the elected local councils. The Republic of Yemen has a multi-party political system. Ever since the unity between erstwhile two-halves the transfer and sharing of power has taken place peacefully through the general elections.
President: The President is the Head of State of the Republic of Yemen. He is elected directly by the people in competitive election in which a number of candidates participate. The candidate who secures maximum number of votes is declared elected as the President and serves the Republic for a term of seven years, which commences from the date he takes the oath for the office. A person, if elected again as President, can remain in office for only two terms.
Local Authority: The Republic of Yemen has a written constitution and rule of law is practised. The Local Authority is established on the principle of financial and administrative decentralisation and the purpose is to expand the opportunities of participating in making policies, plans and programmes and taking decisions as well as making the society partner in taking decisions related to running their daily life and improving their living standards. Thus the basic function of administrative agencies of different governorates and districts in Yemen is supervising and implementing laws and laws of better functioning.
In order to achieve the objective of effective administration the Local Authority into 21 governors including the Capital Secretariat and Raimah governorate formed during 2004.
The governorates are further divided into 333 districts that are branched into 2,099 centres, 37,598 villages and 68,215 localities or neighbourhoods.
TERRAIN
Yemen is a country that shows diverse geographic regions, which can be broadly classified into five major categories:
Coastal Plain Region: It extends sporadically along the coasts of Yemen, where the mountains and hills cut through it to reach directly to the sea waters at more than one place. The coastal plain region of Yemen comprises the following plains: Tehama Plain, Tuban-Abyan plain, Maifa’a Ahwar plain and the Eastern Coastal plain which lies in Almahrah governorate. The coastal plain region is characterised by a hot climate throughout the year with very little rainfall ranging between 50-100 mm per annum. However, it is an important agricultural region, particularly Tehama Plain, due to the large valleys that penetrate throughout, with flood water from the mountain rains pouring into them.
The Mountain Highlands Region: This region stretches along the farthest borders of Yemen in the North to the farthest point in the South. This region has undergone many formation processes that resulted in major and minor fractures. Some of them are parallel to the Red Sea and others parallel to Aden Gulf.
These processes have also led to the formation of high plateaus within which some mountainous basins or fields have been formed.
The region is rich with surface valleys that shape it into sharp sloping block. A mountain wall overlooks Tehama plain with sloping cliffs and peaks.
This region’s mountains have highest peaks in the Arabian Peninsula. The average height is 2000m and Alnabi Shuaib is the highest peak with the height of 3666m.
Water flows through many valleys and it looks like water separates the mountains. Some of the main valleys are Mawr, Haradh, Zabeed, Seham and Raisan that pour their water into the Red Sea. As for the valleys, which pour their water into Aden Gulf and the Arab Sea, the main ones are Wadi Tuban, Wadi Bana and Hadramout Wadi.
Mountain Basin Region: This region has mountains, plains and basins, which are mostly located in the eastern section of the water division line that stretches from the farthest North to the farthest South. The main basins are Yareem, Dhamar, Abar,Sana’a , Amran and Sa’ada. The Plateau Area Region lies parallel to the east and the north of the Mountain Highlands. But it widens more towards the Empty Quarter and then begins a gradual decline. The surface mildly slides towards the north and the east. The major portion of the surface of this region is formed from rocky desert, which is intercepted by some valleys, particularly Hadramout and Hareeb valleys.
Desert Region: It is a sandy region almost devoid of flora except in the areas where rain water runs through after descending from the mountains adjacent to this region. It is 500-1000m above sea level and slopes without terrain discontinuity towards the northeast to the centre of the Empty Quarter. The climate is severe with high temperature, scarce rainfall and low humidity.
Yemeni Islands: There are many islands in the Yemen territorial waters. They have their own peculiar terrain, climate and environment. Most of these islands lie in the Red Sea of which the most significant ones are Kamaran, which is the largest inhabited island in the Red Sea, Hunnish Archipelago and Meon Island, which has a strategic location in Bab Almandab strait, the southern gateway of the Red Sea. Some of the main islands in the Arabian Sea are Socotra Archipelago, which is considered the largest island in this archipelago, Samhah, Darsah and Abduljori, which is known for its biodiversity with estimated 680 species of plants.
CLIMATE
Yemen overlooks two seas, the Red Sea and the Arabian Sea. However, Yemen’s climate does not benefit a lot from the marine characteristics apart from rising air humidity in the coasts. As such, the influence of these two seas in defining the Republic’s climate features is very limited and is just confined to humidity and impacting the wind features, but their effect in air instability is limited. Rain falls during two seasons; spring (March-April) and summer (July-August). Rainfall is much more during summer. The amount of rainfall varies greatly from one place to another. The highest amount of annual rainfall is in the southwest highlands of Ibb, Taiz, Aldhale’a and Yareem. The amount of rainfall ranges between 600-1500m annually. However, in Hodeidah and Mokha, in the western coastal plain, despite exposure to the south-west monsoon from the Indian Ocean the rainfall is the least. But the average rainfall increases with the altitude to 50 mm on the coast to about 1000 mm on the slopes of the mountains facing the Red Sea.
The same is true about Yemen’s southern and eastern coasts, Aden. This can be attributed to many factors but the significant one is that the direction of humid wind movement runs parallel with the coast without penetrating into the internal areas. Here the rain is of no economic significance whatsoever Alfayoush, Alkud and Alrayan experience only about 50mm rain per annum. Temperature in the eastern and southern plains ranges from 25°C to 42°C. But at higher altitudes the temperature ranges from 20°C to 33°C. During winter the temperature on the highlands can dip to Zero degree. During the winter of 1986 Dhamar Governorate recorded a temperature of -12°. Humidity in the coastal plains can reach up to more than 80%, but in the inner desert regions it can dip to the low of just 15%.