Eight months of unrest and rising violence in the south have crippled Yemen’s economy, whose output grew 8 percent last year.

“It (growth) could be negative if we continue to have this political crisis,” Central Bank Governor Mohamed bin Humam said on the sidelines of a meeting of Arab central bank governors in Doha.

“I don’t know how much, we don’t have such data from the real sectors so we can’t assume, but it could be negative. It is difficult to tell without having such data for that.”

The International Monetary Fund forecast in April economic growth in Yemen, where some 40 percent of its 23 million people live on less than $2 a day, to slow to 3.4 percent in 2011.

Yemen has a per capita income of less than $2,600. Poverty, corruption and soaring unemployment have helped fuel the protests since January.

The unrest has led to power, water, fuel and food shortages across the country and forced many factories to close.

Humam said it was difficult to give an estimate of the cost of the unrest.

Gross foreign currency reserves level, vital to help cover a deepening fiscal gap, plunged by $1.3 billion in the first half of 2011 after a March attack on a key pipeline caused losses estimated at around $300-400 million. The pipeline reopened in July.

“As of today the gross reserves are $4.8 billion ... These are hard figures. I think given the crisis this is okay,” the central bank governor said.

Humam said he did not anticipate reserves would decline further in coming months.

“Now ... we have the Marib oil flowing in, so we have less imports of petrol products. So I think we will keep within that level as of the end of this year,” he said.

The central bank has no plans to directly intervene to support the rial currency — which stood at 234 to the dollar on Thursday — Humam said.

“The exchange rate is good given the crisis,” he said.

“We no longer intervene in the market but we ... finance essential foods.”

The rial has lost around 14 percent of its value during the protests, nearing a historic low of 250 to the dollar seen last August.

The central bank last directly intervened in the first quarter of this year to the tune of $340 million. It has also financed food imports with about $600 million this year, Humam said. It spent $2 billion on interventions and food imports in 2010.

The central bank governor also said inflation about 15-16 percent was a worry.

“Of course, we should be concerned, we are a central bank. We need stability, we try to be stable but there is nothing we can do when we have this crisis.”

The International Monetary Fund said in July that inflation could surge to as high as 30 percent this year due to the violence.

“The crisis first needs to be solved politically. There is nothing we can do on the economic side unless it is solved politically,” Humam said.