Mukalla, Yemen – A reported decision to impose thousands of dollars on shipping bound for Yemen will raise the cost of imported goods and food in the war-torn country, experts fear, as the economic impact of Israel’s conflict with the United States and Iran begins to be felt.
Local traders and officials earlier this month informed importers of a new fee of about $3,000 per container bound for Yemen, described as a “war risk” fee. The surprise move prompted government officials to scramble to assess and address its potential consequences.
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Since Yemen imports about 90 percent of its food and other essentials, economists and humanitarian organizations have warned that increases in shipping and insurance costs could quickly translate into higher prices for fuel, food and other goods, worsening an already dire humanitarian situation.
Mohsen al-Amri, the transport minister of Yemen’s internationally recognized government in the southern city of Aden, said he had instructed ships already docked at Yemeni ports or bound for the country not to pay fees, insisting the ports remain secure.
“Our ports are far from geopolitical tension areas in the Gulf and Strait of Hormuz, and imposing ‘risk’ fees on shipments to these relatively safe areas is unjustified from operational and security perspectives,” he said in a social media post last week.
Al Jazeera has reached out to the shipping companies to confirm details of the charges, but has yet to receive responses.
For more than a decade, Yemen has been gripped by a bloody war between the Saudi-backed government based in Aden and the Iran-aligned Houthi movement, which controls the capital Sanaa. The conflict has killed and injured thousands and displaced millions in what the United Nations once described as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. Hostilities have subsided significantly since April 2022, when the warring parties tentatively agreed to a United Nations-mediated agreement.
‘high risk’
Yemen’s ports have long been classified as high risk, prompting shipping companies to charge war-risk surcharges, said Abdulrab al-Khulaki, deputy chairman of Yemen’s Gulf of Aden Ports Corporation. These can reach around $500 per 20-foot container and $1,000 per 40-foot container on top of normal shipping costs.
Al-Khulaki said the $3,000 fee now demanded was “extremely high and unusual,” but was justified by shipping companies because Yemeni ports are considered unsafe despite being far from Iran.
Although the Houthis are allied with Iran and have attacked shipping in the Red Sea since Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, the Yemeni group has yet to intervene in the US-Israel-Iran conflict. Other Yemeni parties are also not involved, making Yemen one of the few regional countries that has yet to see any violence related to the fighting.
In addition to restricting local merchants from paying the new fees, the Yemeni government is considering other measures to pressure shipping companies to cancel the fees, including threatening to stop the docking of ships belonging to those companies in Yemeni ports. Authorities may allow traders to contact exporters directly in source countries to negotiate any additional charges.
The new surcharges come as the United Nations again warned of Yemen’s deteriorating humanitarian situation, with 65.4 percent of the population – some 23.1 million people – in need of urgent humanitarian assistance and protection services this year. This represents an increase of approximately 3.5 million people compared to 2025.
“Yemen is facing a food security crisis,” the World Food Program said in its February Yemen food security update released on March 5. “January 63 percent of households are struggling to meet their minimum food needs.
Bypassing Yemen ports
In addition to rising insurance fees on shipments to Yemen, the war in Iran and potential disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz could cut key supply lines from regional hub ports such as Jebel Ali in the United Arab Emirates.
Mustafa Nasr, head of the Studies and Economic Media Center, told Al Jazeera that shipping companies may start looking for alternative hub ports to deliver goods to Yemen, which could increase costs and cause delays.
“The closure of Jebel Ali port will force shipping lines to seek alternative ports that are further away and involve significantly higher transportation costs,” he said.
Nabil Abdullah bin Ifan, manager and maritime researcher at the government-run Maritime Affairs Authority of Hadhramout province, said most cargo arriving at Mukalla port – the province’s main port – is transported from Dubai in wooden dhows.
If disruptions occur in the Strait of Hormuz, traders may turn to alternative regional hub ports such as Salalah in Oman or Jeddah in Saudi Arabia, he said.
“Big ships come to Dubai to unload their containers, and the traders then unload the goods from the containers and load them onto primitive ships with no insurance,” Bin Ifan told Al Jazeera.
For now, wheat shipments from Ukraine and cargo from China to Yemen may see price hikes due to rising insurance costs, while products imported from Gulf countries may disappear from the market.
Bin Ifan said shipping lines may consider routing cargo through the Cape of Good Hope rather than the Gulf.
“Even before the recent developments involving Iran, ports in our region were considered high risk. However, after the relative calm after the cessation of Houthi attacks in the Red Sea, confidence gradually returned and ships started sailing to the region again. Now, the war has brought the problem back,” he said.
All this means that Yemenis, already struggling with poverty and hunger after years of war, will have to pay more for imported food and goods.
Abdullah al-Hadad, an English teacher in Taiz city with 40 years of experience in the profession, said his monthly salary – less than $80 – is already insufficient to meet his basic needs. Meat and fish have become luxuries for his family, and he still owes nearly a million Yemeni riyals (about $670) to a local grocer.
To make ends meet, he works extra jobs as a taxi driver and at a grocery store, while his children work after school to support the family and pay for medication for his 10-year-old son, who has autism.
“What I am experiencing as a government employee is the lowest salary, which does not even cover basic needs like bread, tea, salt and sugar,” Al-Hadad told Al Jazeera.
“Other foods essential to a healthy diet, such as meat or fish, are a distant dream.”
(tags to translate)Economy
