ROME, Dec 17 (AFP) - Up to 40 million people face hunger across Africa, in a crisis worsened by high rates of HIV/AIDS, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said in a grim pre-Christmas report released here Tuesday.
"There is an urgent need to expedite commercial imports and food aid distributions to avert a major humanitarian catastrophe in southern Africa," the report said.
The warning of deepening humanitarian crisis came in FAO's Food Supply Situation and Crop Prospects in Sub-Saharan Africa, released by the Rome-based agency.
The situation was most serious in southern Africa, where FAO, citing latest available figures, say 16.7 million people need emergency food assistance to survive until the next harvest in April 2003.
"Because of the high rates of HIV/AIDS throughout the sub-region, widespread hunger threatens many people with life-threatening complications," it said.
The warning follows the launch on Monday of an "Africa Hunger Alert" by the World Food Programme (WFP), aimed at drawing international attention to what it called an unprecedented hunger crisis in Africa.
FAO reports serious delays in the distribution of food aid in Zambia and Zimbabwe. "Commercial maize imports have also been slow and prices have started to rise in several countries."
Malnutrition rates remain high in areas of Angola previously cut off by war, FAO said. "Internally displaced persons returning home lack access to basic health services," according to the report.
It said 12.7 million dollars (euros) is needed to help southern Africa's "neediest" farmers buy seeds, fertilizers and hand tools.
The report also warns that serious food shortages are looming in several countries in the Horn of Africa, "where at least 17.5 million people are without sufficient food."
It highlights Eritrea and Ethiopia as the countries where the need for food aid is most urgent.
"In Eritrea, a third of the population is facing severe food shortages because of drought."
"In Ethiopia, poor and erratic rains have caused severe food problems for millions of people," the report said, adding that large numbers of livestock had died.
"Overall, 25 countries in sub-Saharan Africa are facing food emergencies caused by problems that range from drought and adverse weather to civil strive, economic difficulties, an increase in internally displaced people and an influx of refugees," the report said.
It listed them as Angola, Burundi, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Republic of Congo, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritania, Mozambique, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
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