Mapping the siege of Yemen’s Taiz, and the price families are paying

Taiz, Yemen – In the besieged city of Taiz, Yousef Farhan’s family has run out of choices at mealtime.

“The whole day, we either eat rice or beans, whether in the morning or in the evening,” the 39-year-old father of four told Al Jazeera.

Shelling forced the family from their home years ago, and they have lived in a school in the southwestern Yemeni city ever since.

Farhan used to sell cucumbers from a small cart in front of the school, earning between 4,000 and 5,000 Yemeni riyals (roughly $2.50 to $3.20) a day. The money was never steady, but it bought a gas cylinder each month and, now and then, a meal with some variety.

Then the siege closed the school, and his trade went with it. The family now cooks over firewood.

“With the suspension of the school due to the shelling and the siege, my source of income stopped, and I was unable to find alternative work since the siege caused many people’s jobs to come to a halt,” he said.

His children, aged five months to five years, depend on whatever he can find. So do his sister and her child, who joined him after their neighbourhood came under fire.

A city of one million, cut off

Taiz, Yemen’s third-largest city, is home to about 1 million of the country’s roughly 43 million people.

The city has been cut off since early October, when it lost both of its land routes. The Houthis took the town of al-Turbah by October 4, severing the Taiz-Al-Turbah-Aden Road, the main artery for goods.

A day earlier, forces loyal to the internationally recognised government closed the eastern al-Houban crossing into Houthi-held territory, citing attempted Houthi incursions.

On October 20, the United Nations warned that road closures and lack of security were blocking vital supplies.

Prices of the food and fuel still available had more than doubled, and Taiz’s water production had dropped by half.

Across Taiz, families like Farhan’s are working out what to eat and whether they can afford to cook it.

The map below shows the main Taiz-Al-Turbah-Aden Road and three other routes out of the city, all now closed.

One day at a time

For weeks, 40-year-old Sayyun Burhan has looked no further ahead than tomorrow.

“We barely live day-to-day, waiting to see how the next day will pass,” she said.

Work is no longer available at the local store where Sayyun’s husband was employed, and his failing health makes it harder for him to find anything else. Meanwhile, the family still needs money for rent, food, water and cooking gas.

Across the city, the cost of water delivered by tankers has roughly tripled since the fighting escalated, according to UN officials.

The strain reaches beyond the kitchen. For Burhan’s children, the siege means missed lessons and long days inside, as she is afraid to let them out.

“They have been deprived of schooling and play,” she said.

Keeping both children safe and fed is becoming harder.

A city running on fumes

Fuel is behind many of Taiz’s civilian emergencies. Diesel keeps water pumps working, hospital generators running and ambulances moving. Petrol enables people can get to work, and patients to treatment. Cooking gas lets families and restaurants prepare food.

But the city’s fuel stations have been closed since October 5.

Prices gathered by Al Jazeera in Taiz show how sharply fuel costs have risen. A 20-litre (5.3-gallon) container of petrol now costs 120,000 riyals ($77), four times last year’s price of 30,000 riyals ($19).

The price of 20 litres of diesel has nearly doubled, from 46,000 riyals ($29) to 90,000 riyals ($58). A cooking gas cylinder has risen from 11,400 riyals ($7) to 40,000 riyals ($26).

Bus fares have risen from 200 riyals (13 cents) to 500 riyals (32 cents), an increase of 150 percent. Every ride now takes a bigger share of household budgets already stretched by rising food prices.

For Farhan, the move to firewood shows how far his family’s spending power has fallen. He once managed with a gas cylinder each month. Now, even a pot of rice or beans depends on what he can burn.

Water shortages are not new in Taiz, but the siege has made them worse. Diesel shortages have disrupted the pumps.

Local authorities say access restrictions are also stopping tankers from the Al-Dhabab basin, an important source of drinking water, from entering the city.

A hospital hall for a home

Fatima Khaled, 55, has kidney failure. She cannot afford repeated trips from her village west of the city to the hospital for treatment, or a room closer to the hospital. She sleeps on the floor of the dialysis hall at Al-Jumhuri General Hospital.

Closed roads and long mountain detours have made every journey for treatment exhausting and expensive.

The hospital itself is under strain. On October 22, the World Health Organization warned that 42 health facilities in Taiz were reporting severe shortages of fuel, oxygen, medicine and medical supplies.

“I feel like I am imprisoned here. We have no housing or shelter here. This hall is our shelter,” Fatima says.