Cooking gas shortage in Socotra threatens vegetation and rare trees
SOCOTRA, Sept. 26 (YPA) – The living and humanitarian crisis in Yemen’s Socotra Archipelago, located east of the Gulf of Aden, is worsening due to a total lack of domestic cooking gas, coupled with continued neglect by Saudi-backed authorities to meet citizens’ needs and supply basic services to the archipelago’s residents.
Local sources in Socotra confirmed that the severe gas crisis persists despite the end of the seasonal monsoon period and the stabilization of sea weather conditions—factors that should make maritime navigation and sea routes fully open to fuel and gas supply ships. The sources noted that the ongoing shortage doubles the burden on residents, who face immense hardship just to obtain a single gas cylinder for their daily cooking needs.
The sources explained that this shortfall is an extension of a recurring series of crippling supply and service crises in Aden and other southern provinces under Saudi control, which suffer from a severe breakdown in public services and a lack of serious interventions to alleviate citizens’ suffering.
Furthermore, the sources warned of catastrophic consequences from the acute domestic gas crisis on the rare environmental and plant biodiversity of the Socotra Archipelago, which is designated as a UNESCO World Natural Heritage site. They pointed out that the lack of cooking gas over recent months has forced locals to resort to rampant wood-cutting (logging) across valleys and natural reserves to secure fuel for cooking.
They highlighted that the spread of uncontrolled wood-cutting threatens to eliminate the vegetation cover, which encompasses hundreds of rare plants and trees found nowhere else on Earth—spelling an environmental disaster that risks stripping the archipelago of its distinctiveness and global natural heritage value.
Socotra residents called on the authorities and the Saudi-backed government to urgently supply domestic gas to end the population’s suffering and curb the destruction of natural habitats and reserves, which represent the archipelago’s true wealth.
YPA