The majority are Sunni Muslims, of the Shafi sect. In the north, many people have close family in Saudi Arabia. Many Yemenis consider Saudi Arabia's Asir province to be part of Yemen.
Agriculture employs more than half the population.
Many Yemenis sought jobs in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states during the 1970s oil boom. More than one million worked in Saudi Arabia, most as manual laborers and farm hands. Their expulsion, a result of Yemen's support for Iraq's invasion of Kuwait in 1990, has raised unemployment within Yemen. In rural areas and in the north, Islamic orthodoxy is strong and most women wear the veil. In the south, however, women still claim the freedoms they had under the Marxist regime, especially in urban areas.