Petroleum accounts for about 91% of the country's exports. Oil export revenues were estimated at $1.4 billion in 1998. Other exports in recent years have included coffee and dried and salted fish; imports included food and live animals, machinery and equipment, and manufactured goods.
In 1998 Yemen's imports were distributed among the following categories:
| Consumer goods | 10.8% |
| Food | 29.4% |
| Fuels | 6.4% |
| Industrial supplies | 27.8% |
| Machinery | 16.6% |
| Transportation | 8.4% |
| Other | 0.6% |
Principal trading partners in 1999 (in millions of US dollars) were as follows:
| COUNTRY | EXPORTS | IMPORTS | BALANCE |
| China (inc. Hong Kong) | 731 | 62 | 669 |
| Thailand | 646 | 39 | 607 |
| Korea | 347 | 29 | 318 |
| Singapore | 207 | 71 | 136 |
| India | 179 | 55 | 124 |
| Kuwait | 53 | 120 | -67 |
| Saudi Arabia | 45 | 246 | -201 |
| United Arab Emirates | 18 | 256 | -238 |
| United States | 16 | 125 | -109 |
| United Kingdom | 5 | 87 | -82 |