Week 1-Activity Post

The country I’ve selected to research for the class will be Yemen. I choose this country because it has many complex social, economic, and medical aspects from shockingly high success, to slow improvement, to none at all. I want to dive deeper into this country’s status to help educate more people, as well as myself, and learn how we can improve lives of citizens.

            To start off, Yemen’s demographic and economic indicators were slightly shocking. Their population is about 24,000 people, with almost half of the population under 181.Their growth rate is 2% due to the fact that their fertility rate is only 4.2%1. This is because of the low amounts of females receiving pre or post-natal care3. The life expectancy is 62.9% which is good considering their mediocre healthcare system1. Yemen’s GDP annual growth rate is only 1.2%, which makes sense because of inflation and their GNI being only $1110, so they are not bringing in a lot of money1. However, only 17.5% of their population is under the poverty line which is much lower than I thought it would be based on the other statistics1.

Secondly, their education and treatment of women is more complex than I originally thought. High literacy rates only vary 20% in male and females1. On the other hand, hardly any children go to pre-primary school, percent are in the 80-90s for primary, and half that for secondary school1. The women are much higher in literacy rates, as well as enrollment than I thought. Also, these rates are interesting considering there is a civil war occurring and schools are getting blown up. Most parents want their children in school so that they do not fight2. However, women in Yemen have to obey their husbands, and get their permission to leave the house3. So, although some fronts have made progress, most are still behind.

            Lastly, the rate of progress, disparities by residence, and by household wealth need more attention. The country is not growing very fast because the fertility rate has decreased from a low 7.5% to 4.2%1. On the other hand, under-5 mortality rate has decreased from 321 to 60 which is much better1. In regard to disparities by residence it is clear in almost every statistic, that urban areas are given way more attention than rural4. Finally, looking at disparities by household wealth, you can see unsurprisingly that in almost every category the rich vastly outweigh the poor by 5-60%1. Most poor people have also stopped seeking medical treatment and going to school because the cost is so high, furthering the gap4.

            To conclude, the combination of demographic and economic indicators, education, treatment of women, rate of progress, disparities by residence and household, shocked me to some degree, but showed most of what I predicted. Yemen is a developing country that still has much to do in regard to all of these aspects. I will be interested to see where my research takes me as I dive deeper into the country’s system.

1. “Statistics.” UNICEF, 31 Dec. 2013, www.unicef.org/infobycountry/yemen_statistics.html.

2. Project, Borgen. “Six Important Things to Know About Education in Yemen.” The Borgen Project, Borgen Project Https://Borgenproject.org/Wp-Content/Uploads/The_Borgen_Project_Logo_small.Jpg, 27 Nov. 2017, borgenproject.org/education-in-yemen/.

3. “Poverty in Yemen.” World Bank, www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2010/01/20/poverty-in-yemen.

4. “Poverty in Yemen.” World Bank, www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2010/01/20/poverty-in-yemen.

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