The World Food Programme (WFP) made an urgent appeal Friday for donations of food from the international community needed to feed the 5.4 million people in the drought-stricken Horn of Africa who are facing starvation.

|TOP|The WFP appealed for an extra 59,000 tonnes of food to avert a “humanitarian catastrophe” in the region, which covers four countries.

The U.N. agency said the estimated number of people now hit by the drought stood at 2.5 million in Kenya, 1.4 million in Somalia, 1.5 million in Ethiopia and 60,000 in Djibouti, reports Reuters.

"Donors must respond now if we are going to avert a humanitarian catastrophe," said Holdbrook Arthur, WFP Regional Director for Eastern and Central Africa while on a trip to Kampala.

Women and small children have been forced to beg for water at roadsides from motorists in the regions of north-eastern Kenya, with some walking as far as 75 miles in search of water.

WFP announced its plans to feed 1 million people in Somalia until the end of June, while aid group CARE announced it will feed an additional 400,000.

|AD|"However, WFP's food stocks are already low and it needs an additional 59,000 tonnes at a cost of $46 million (26 million pounds)," WFP said in a statement on Friday.

The WFP has been forced to use land transport because of sea piracy through northern Kenya and Djibouti, which is more expensive and slower, severely hindering the agency’s efforts to bring food and water aid to the drought-stricken communities.

The agency also said southern Somalia was about to suffer the worst cereal harvest in a decade because of drought, adding that the situation in Kenya was expected to worsen in coming months. It said without more funds its assistance may run out as early as February.

In Ethiopia, WFP said initial findings showed that 1.5 million pastoralists in the southern Somali region and an estimated 250,000 in the Borena zone of the Oromiya region will require food assistance from January to June of 2006.

This is in addition to some 5.5 million people already being assisted by WFP through its various operations in Ethiopia.