Yemen’s valleys and farms are full of dangerous plastic waste
Yemen’s eastern Wadi Dawan valley is picturesque, but on closer inspection the scourge of plastic waste is clear to see. Wadi Dawan, Yemen – From
Yemen’s eastern Wadi Dawan valley is picturesque, but on closer inspection the scourge of plastic waste is clear to see. Wadi Dawan, Yemen – From above, Wadi Dawan looks untouched – a ribbon of date palms winding through towering cliffs, divided by a white wadi bed. Scattered mud‑brick homes cling to the rocky slopes, overlooking one of Yemen’s most celebrated agricultural valleys, renowned for its palm dates and quality honey. But continuing down into the valley, a starkly different picture emerges: plastic waste litters the flood channels, while the smell of burning rubbish hangs in the air, triggering coughs and polluting the valley’s once‑clean atmosphere. “By God, this is a very serious problem,” said Yousef Abdullah, a 65‑year‑old farmer and orchard owner, speaking angrily to Al Jazeera. “If it remains unresolved, it will cause a disaster.” Yousef stood beneath the shade of date palms, surrounded by a blanket of plastic bags, bottles, and food wrappers. Throughout Wadi Dawan, home to thousands of people across dozens of scattered villages in Yemen’s eastern Hadramout province, plastic bags, bottles, and other household waste litter roadsides and palm groves. Piles of rubbish – including dead animals – are dumped into flood channels that irrigate the valley’s farms. Household waste is mixed with sewage discharged into the wadi bed, while mounds of rubbish are dumped along roadsides just metres from people’s homes. Yousef said that floods flowing through the valley pick up the waste, blocking irrigation channels, and depriving some farms of the vital waters they need. That has forced farmers to rush to the channels whenever the floods arrive, clearing the waste that has accumulated before the water recedes.
“We move from one irrigation channel to another leading to our farms, removing plastic bags, construction debris, and trees,” Yousef said. “We have to do it carefully because broken glass hidden in the rubbish can easily cut us.” And then, after the floodwater recedes, Yousef and other farmers return to their fields and collect the plastic bottles and bags before they can sow their seeds. Waste awareness initiative Residents, environmental advocates, and local officials say the growing problem is driven by the lack of a proper waste collection system and limited public awareness of the environmental and health risks of indiscriminate dumping. Large parts of the valley have no waste collection points at all. In the places that do, green rubbish bins can be seen along the roads, but are often overflowing. Garbage trucks are supposed to collect waste from the bins once a week, but the service is often disrupted because of a lack of funding and poor vehicle maintenance. With almost no funding or resources, Salem Raji, who heads the Ministry of Agriculture’s office in Wadi Dawan and is also an agricultural researcher, launched an initiative to draw attention to the growing problem of waste dumping in his home valley. He has met with local officials, spoken to local media and used social media to warn residents about the environmental consequences of dumping rubbish into the valley’s flood channels. “The agricultural sector is particularly affected by plastic waste, which contaminates the soil and leads to poor or even failed crop yields,” Raji said. “Waste causes numerous problems in the main irrigation canals, blocking water flow, damaging canal walls and preventing floodwater from reaching farmland.
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