However, following the Arab Spring in 2011, the government led by Ali Abdullah Saleh was forced to hand over power to his vice president and a transitional unity government. Using this political vacuum and the unpopularity of the transition government, the Houthis began making military gains against the internationally‐recognized government after its formation in 2012 in the hopes of having more representation in the transitional government. These military gains eventually led to the quick capture of the capital Sana`a in September 2014, and then eventually an attempt to capture the southern part of the country.<sup>11</sup> Beginning in March 2015, following the attempted capture of the southern part of the country, a coalition of nine Gulf and North African countries started to target Houthi positions with air strikes in an attempt to stop the Houthi aggression and support the internationally recognized government. It is important to note that the current conflict is actually composed of a number of different conflict‐related shocks. First, there has been a significant amount of violence, that is steadily increasing in intensity. The violence has resulted in a loss of human and physical capital, and in other contexts, has led to a nearly universal drop in aggregate, firm‐level, and individual economic outcomes where the conflict intensity has been the worst (e.g., Abadie and Gardeazaba 2003; Singh and Pedersen 2003; Guidolin and La Ferrara 2007; Collier and Duponchel 2013; Klapper et al. 2013; Ksoll et al. 2015; Amodio and Di Maio 2018; Tandon 2019; etc.).

Second, there has been a significant tightening of the ports due to the presence of coalition navy forces restricting imports in ports that supply regions in the north where Houthi forces have a strong presence. Importantly, this restricts the imports of food to a country that imported approximately 90 percent of its food prior to the conflict (e.g., WFP 2012), and it restricts the ability of health providers to acquire vital equipment and medicines that are badly needed in a setting where communicable diseases have been raging out of control (e.g., OCHA 2018). Although it is difficult to precisely gauge the intensity of this disruption to supply chains, reports have suggested that immediately following the escalation of the conflict, imports in Al Hudaydah‐ the port that supplies nearly the entirety of the north‐ immediately reduced to 40 percent of pre‐conflict levels (e.g., WFP 2017).

Third, the government began paying public salaries infrequently, if at all, beginning in November 2016. Nearly 30 percent of households relied at least in part on government salaries, and in the capital, this figure was nearly one of every two households (e.g., World Bank 2017). Thus, many households lost income that was helping to support them at precisely the time supply chains were disrupted and prices of basic commodities and food items began to rise (e.g., WFP 2017). In addition to the decline in incomes, anecdotal evidence suggests that the lack of payment of employees has led to an exodus of public sector employees.<sup>12</sup> This in turn has significantly reduced the amount of public services provided to the Yemeni people and likely has hampered institutional capacity.

Each of these conflict‐related shocks has likely contributed to the dramatic worsening of humanitarian conditions in the country. However, little thorough analysis has investigated the relative role played by each of these major factors. This paper investigates the relationship between temporal and geographic variation in food security and variation in each of the potential drivers described above. Conflict data were obtained from the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED), which provides information on the date, location, event type, actors involved, and the number of people killed in each

> 11 See (accessed July 2017): <u>http://www.bbc.com/news/world‐middle‐east‐29319423.</u>

> 12 For example, the Central Statistical Organization has stated in informal discussions that much of their staff has departed following the inability to pay their salaries regularly.

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