The crisis that the agricultural sector is going through in Abyan Governorate (southern Yemen), with the decline in agricultural production during the last period, especially the banana crop by which Abyan governorate is famous for its cultivation, has forced many agricultural landowners to reduce the recruitment of labor force. This exacerbated the suffering of a large percentage of workers in this vital sector and led to the expansion of poverty and unemployment rates.
Amna Saleh, one of the workers, who used to struggle every morning and work in the banana fields, complained to Khuyut about her deteriorating living conditions and her failure to provide her family with essential needs and daily food as a result of the lack of job opportunities on farms.
“No one asks us to work anymore,” with is statement, Amna summed up with sorrow her suffering along with tens of colleague workers. Amna resumed her talk after a sigh filled with regret: “In the past, there were many working opportunities for us, so that we were able to select the most appropriate job in terms of financial returns, plus we used to work on a daily basis, from sunrise to sunset.” Amna said.
Unmanageable Challenges
It is a matter of fact that, farms with abundant agricultural production need a large number of workers in order to get the work done faster and in an optimal manner. In the Ba Tays agricultural area, located on the banks of the (Bana) valley in the Abyan delta (south of the country), the cultivation of high-quality bananas is widespread and noticeable. Despite the diversity of agricultural products in the area, bananas come on the top of the agricultural production in area.
The banana crop is one of the most productive and well-known agricultural crops in the Abyan Delta, along with mangoes, papayas, melons, and many other vegetables. Bananas are grown in various areas of Abyan, most of which are Ba-Tays, Al-Musaimeer and Al-Koud, where the cultivated lands of banana crop amounted to about 80% of the total agricultural lands of those areas.
The interest of agricultural landowners in the Abyan Delta to grow bananas over the past years may be attributed to a number of factors, most notably: the fertility of the soil of the farms, which are located along the Bana and Hassan valleys and the availability of a suitable climate for the cultivation of this type of crops. In addition to the ease of producing this crop continuously, as the crop is harvested twice a month in the summer, and once a month during the winter, in addition to growing a many other vegetables and fruits.
Moreover, the expansion of banana-growing areas throughout the delta regions provided job opportunities for many citizens who depend mainly on agriculture for their income, as the farms accommodate large numbers of workers, who find in banana plantations and others products a welcoming opportunity to obtain a good return throughout the agricultural seasons.
However, high-quality banana production in Abyan Delta is facing many challenges and threats such as drought resulting from the scarcity of precipitation in its seasons, and the high-level torrential waves that hit the governorate from time to time without benefiting from it as well as the erosion of vast areas of fertile agricultural lands as a result of the disruption of the water channels from the famous Ba Tays Dam. Consequently, many farm owners refrained from cultivating bananas and other crops with the same production rate, which negatively affected large group of the daily wages farming workers there.
The banana crop is one of the most productive and famous agricultural crops in the Abyan Delta, along with mangoes, papayas, melons, and many other vegetables. Bananas are grown in various areas of Abyan, most of which are Ba-Tays, Al-Musaimeer and Al-Koud, where the cultivated lands of banana crop amounted to about 80% of the total agricultural lands of those areas.
During the past years, the volume of crop production ranged between 80 to 100 tons per day - according to the agriculture office in the governorate - which is a percentage that is sufficient to absorb the largest number of manpower for harvesting, weighing, packaging and carrying, in a way that makes those farms full of life and vitality throughout the hours of the day.
Yet, the recent dramatic decrease in banana production, which decreased to twenty tons per day, led to the dismissal of hundreds of workers in those farms as the landowners were unable to afford the usual labor force and satisfied with a small number of essential workers, which made many of them struggle to find an alternative job opportunity in the agricultural area.
In this context, Mahmoud Rajeh, an owner of agricultural lands in the Ba Tays region, confirmed to "Khuyut" that, the low rate of banana production in the region, as the quantity exported from his farms amounted to only 500 kilos of bananas, while the average of quantities he used to export exceeded 5 tons every 15 days. He also pointed out that the decrease in the volume of production was a result of the dryness of wells and the scarcity of rain, which exposed large areas of their lands to drought and desertification that negatively affected landowners and farmers working in these farms alike.
Looking for other job opportunities
Recently, agricultural workers are in constant daily search for some other job opportunity to protect their families from famine. This made many of them forced to leave their villages and go out in search of other job opportunities away from the farms in their areas. Haidara Mohammad (38 years old), a farmer working for daily wages, confirmed to Khuyut that: “We waited long time for the agricultural situation to improve, and for production to return to its previous state, as we used to work day and night in large numbers in various farms, especially in banana plantations, most of which we used to export to the Gulf countries.” Mohammad went on his statement, saying: "But the situation has become exhausting for me and for many, which forced me to quit working in agriculture, and resort to one of the cities of Abyan to work as a porter of goods in some shops."
It is worth noting that in recent years, Abyan governorate has been exposed to torrential floods that swept away vast areas of the total agricultural land, which amounts to approximately 150,000 acres in the Abyan Delta.
Abdullah Muhammad (a farmer) describes the situation of banana farms in Abyan governorate, saying: "A friend of mine and I used to rent agricultural farms and plant them with bananas, due to the high demand for buying it in large quantities and on an ongoing basis."
He continued: "We were making good profits, which motivate us to continue in this work, but in the past two years we could no longer bear the deteriorating situation after we were besieged by many obstacles, including: the insufficient flood waters reaching our lands after the water ferries were breached, and the lack of rainfall - to the point of non-existence - In addition to the high prices of oil derivatives that we need for operating the water pumps to get water from the wells - if there is water in them - and cessation of the export of bananas outside Yemen, which made very small returns in exchange for our inputs".
Further, Abdullah confirmed that despite all these obstacles, we did not give up to despair from the first moment, but rather tried to find alternative solutions that mitigate the severity of the loss as they had to reduce the workforce and reduce the area allocated for agriculture from the total leased land. However, all their attempts failed, after the farmers we left to face most of these difficulties on their own, due to the lack of any support from the office of agriculture in the governorate.
Land dryness and desertification
The Abyan Delta, the fertile land that extends from the Yaramis area in the Khanfar district, to the Qurayyat area in the Zanzibar district, is famous for growing many agricultural crops of high-quality fruits and vegetables, part of which is consumed locally and quantities are exported to neighboring governorates. The governorate was also known throughout the past decades as the food basket due to its location on the banks of the Bana and Hassan valleys, making its lands qualified for the cultivation of various crops, and making those interested in agriculture flock to the lands of the delta where they find their purpose.
In recent years, the governorate has been exposed to torrential floods that swept away vast areas of the total agricultural land, amounting to about 150,000 acres in the Abyan Delta.
Additionally, the erosion of agricultural lands, the destruction of water channels, and the deterioration and collapse of the Ba Tays Dam, posed complicated challenges that exceeded the capacity of the farmers to absorb and solve, in light of the failure of the agricultural and irrigation offices in the governorate to play their role. Thus, farmers had no choice but to neglect large areas of their land which were subject to desertification and drought.
According to official statistics from the Office of Agriculture and Irrigation in the governorate, the total agricultural land that was completely desertified amounted to 15,000 acres, and the areas exposed to desertification amounted to 30,000 acres out of the total 150,000 acres of Delta lands.
Many agricultural lands far from the floods, which depend entirely on wells for their irrigation, have been exposed to drought and desertification as a result of the scarcity of groundwater resulting from the scarcity of rainfall in the region. As a result, many owners of these lands resorted to planning them to construct residential neighborhoods and sell them to benefit from the money in establishing income-generating projects that bring them steady income and guarantee them and their families a decent life, according to some landowners.
In the context, Abdullah Muhawil Tubaiq, Director of the Irrigation Department in Abyan Governorate, pointed out that due to climate changes and fluctuations, the fertility of the agricultural soil was greatly affected.
In his statement to "Khuyut", Tubaiq confirmed that the governorate of Abyan has fertile soil that allows it to grow many crops. However, in recent seasons it has been subjected to torrential waves which swept away vast areas of agricultural land as a result of the collapse of many of the defensive barriers in the Ba Tays Dam because of the high level of water in the dam and the large flow of torrents, which made much of the land vulnerable to desertification with the passage of years and seasons.
