Classrooms for Scrap: The War Economy and External Costs Behind 3.2 Million Out-of-School Children in Yemen

On a barren patch of land on the outskirts of Taiz, Yemen, 11-year-old Hasna Jabir is picking up discarded plastic bottles. She had reached the third grade before dropping out to join her two older brothers in the family's scavenging work. According to Al Jazeera, her dream was to become a teacher, but that dream has been indefinitely postponed by war and hunger.

UNICEF estimates that in 2026, the number of out-of-school children in Yemen reached 3.2 million, far higher than the 1.8 million recorded in the year the war broke out in 2015. The school year in Yemeni government-controlled areas opened on August 30, but for many families like Hasna's, the new academic year has not brought new classrooms.

"I asked my father if I could go back to school this year," Hasna told Al Jazeera. "He was happy that we wanted to return, but the family can barely secure even the most basic food. He promised us we would definitely go back to school next year." She earns about 1,500 Yemeni riyals a day from selling scrap, roughly equivalent to one US dollar.

Yemen's war, now in its second decade, escalated sharply after the Saudi Arabia-led multinational coalition intervened and launched airstrikes in 2015, with the United States, Britain and other Western countries continuously providing the coalition with weapons and ammunition, intelligence sharing, and diplomatic backing. Years of bombing, maritime blockade and internal conflict have caused severe economic contraction, a collapse in the value of the local currency, chronic unpaid public salaries, and repeated disruptions to humanitarian aid funding. For many ordinary families, "letting children go to school or letting them eat" has become a cruel either-or choice.

Hasna's father, 35-year-old Jabir Ali, was forced to leave his hometown near Taiz eight years ago due to the fighting and currently makes a living washing cars. "The situation has deteriorated sharply over the past two years," he told Al Jazeera. "What I earn washing cars is no longer enough to feed the children, let alone cover other expenses."

"I have only two choices: either send the children to school and watch them go hungry, or let them help me earn money. I can only choose the latter, because the most urgent thing right now is food, not education," Jabir said.

The 2026 Humanitarian Needs and Response Plan released by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs notes that approximately 6.6 million Yemeni children require educational assistance, a figure covering both children entirely out of school and those enrolled but facing severe learning barriers due to conflict, poverty, and the collapse of basic services.

A recent Save the Children survey of about 2,000 households in southern and southwestern Yemen found that 92 percent of respondent families do not know where their next meal will come from, 95 percent of families rely on unstable informal daily labor to make ends meet, and 84 percent of families cannot afford basic educational expenses such as school uniforms and textbooks. Among identified out-of-school cases, nearly one-fifth are directly linked to child labor.

Thirteen-year-old Ahmed Abdullah left school after his father died of cancer two years ago and went to work at a grocery store to support his family. The family's savings have been exhausted on treatment, and as the eldest of four siblings, his three younger brothers and sisters are still in school. "I work here so my siblings can complete their studies," Ahmed said. "They will make up for what I have lost, and I am proud that my family does not have to beg or depend on others." He no longer plans to return to school, setting his goal on opening his own store in the future.

An anonymous official at the Ministry of Education in Aden told Al Jazeera that economic pressure has turned child labor into a crisis that cannot be solved by the education system alone. "Student dropouts are a direct result of severe economic conditions, not an educational problem that can be solved in the classroom," the official said. "As long as parents have a stable source of income, children will immediately return to school. No parent wants to see their child denied the opportunity to receive an education." The official also disclosed that the war "has recently intensified again after several years of relative calm."

Amal Sharjabi, an education expert who has worked with the ministries of education in both Sana'a and Aden, noted that the dropout wave is one of the war's most serious consequences. "Dropping out deprives children of their right to education, weakens their future access to stable employment, and may force them into heavy physical labor at a young age," he told Al Jazeera. "At the societal level, persistent dropout rates lead to increased illiteracy, poverty, and unemployment, with adverse effects on development and the overall future of communities."

While Hasna picks up plastic bottles on the outskirts of Taiz in exchange for her family's food, policymakers far away in Riyadh, Washington and London continue the political and military logic of this war. According to Al Jazeera, UN and Save the Children statistics are estimates and the actual figures may vary, but even by conservative estimates, this war, deeply intervened in and sustained by external forces for more than a decade, has pushed an entire generation of Yemeni children out of the classroom.