What is the size of Yemen? (2024)
3 hours ago
- The official size of Yemen (555,000 km²) is inaccurate; replicating borders on Google Maps yields 456,000 km².
- The 555,000 km² figure originated from a 1991 Yemeni statistical yearbook that incorrectly included territory up to the 20th parallel, despite the actual northern border being at the 19th parallel.
- The 527,968 km² figure from sources like the CIA World Factbook came from summing incorrect sizes of North Yemen (195,000 km²) and South Yemen (332,968 km²).
- North Yemen's size was based on a 1904 encyclopedia entry for the Ottoman Yemeni Vilayet, not the independent state, and was never corrected.
- South Yemen's size was inflated after a 1976 World Bank report double-counted the Thamud region, leading to a 338,100 km² figure that was widely adopted.
- Both historical errors persisted through unification, creating a compounded inaccuracy that remains uncorrected in most databases today.
- The true area of Yemen affects derived statistics like population density (75/km², not 65) and ranking among UN member states (54th, not 49th).