22 May Yemen’s new birth….Embraces all colors of political spectrum [Archives:2003/637/Business & Economy]

Every year the Yemeni people celebrate the anniversary of Yemeni unification on the 22 May 1990. this year the people of Yemen observe the 13th anniversary of the Yemeni unification that restored the two parts of Yemen in a context of a new political system founded on democratic approach rules, respect ideas of all colors forming the Yemeni political spectrum and multi-party system.
Celebrating this occasion comes this year while the Yemenis feel it is embodied by features of the national bond of the sons of Yemen who are reaping nowadays the fruit of Yemeni unity in all fields.

Economy & trade development
After 13 years of unified political action the Yemeni republic has witnessed tangible economic progress led to increasing exports from YR 16 billion in 1990 to YR 659.8 billion in 2000. The overall volume of exports/imports amounted to about YR 1040.4 billion with a growth rate by around 75% from the value of gross domestic product.

Implementation of economic reform program
During the elapsed 13 years of the united state of Yemen the government adopted a program for economic reform with which it exerted efforts supported by donor countries, funds and organizations to improve the economic performance of the country, to curb the budget deficit and to follow a policy of openness toward he free market in addition to encouragement of local and external investments.
The unified state of Yemen has gone ahead in the democratic approach and laid political traditions for legislative, presidential and local councils elections. It has unleashed freedom of press and establishment of political parties in the country. Regarding public services sector, the state has built about 2000 schools and the number of universities raised to seven instead of 3 and built 6 institutes for training teachers from both sexes. The unity government spent more than YR25 billion on water projects and more than YR 16 billion on roads. `the government took care for developing both agricultural and fish sector. The planted area of land exceeded 1280 hectares while more than 270 water installations have been built at a cost of more than YR 548 million. The government developed modern methods for fishery and cost of investment in this field exceeded YR 7 billion. It continued the work in mineral and oil explorations where geographical and geological surveys revealed the existence of gold ores and a number of minerals having economic feasibility. Added to that the rise in oil production capacity to reach 465 barrels per day and the liquefied gas reserve volume hit beyond 16 trillion metric tons.
Unification of Yemen has been an auxiliary element for industrial sector expansion. The number of industrial installations amounted to 33.328 thousand at an increase percentage of 70% and consequently provided around 115.529 thousand job opportunities.

Encouragement of private sector
Under the new economic climate of the unified state, the private sector has become more active. Its investments in industry jumped from 129 projects in 1992 to 803 projects in 2000 at an investment cost of licensed projects reaching YR 410 billion. With the expansion of the geographical area of the unified state of Yemen, the country has become in possession a variety of tourist attraction constituents. The have gathered between desert, beaches and diving tourism. The number of tourists frequenting Yemeni tourist sites and landscapes climbed from 10000 in 1990 to 85000 in 1999. Proportion of domestic tourism increased to about 3 million persons.

Development of human resources
Despite some disturbances that the unified state has faced the progress of political, economic and social development is still going on with calm and organized steps to attain the targeted objectives in managing affairs of human resources capable of leading the country to safety. The total power of workforce reached in 2001 to about 459272 employees, 56197 of them are working at state departments and central apparatuses.
Human resources in Yemen, according to statistics by the ministry of civil service, are distributed as follows: a- administration 360223, b- judicial apparatus 7398, c- public sector 84380, d- mixed sector 7271. The ministry is now working on effecting visions that would offer solutions to failure resulting from distribution of the workforce. The aim is to lay foundation for the principle of equal opportunities and to provide administrative institutions with the best efficient employees
All these data and others indicate the importance of the 22 May unification that united the people of Yemen under the banner of the republic of Yemen that contributed to stability in the region and settling border dispute by peaceful ways.
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