The UN World Food Program (WFP) on Tuesday appealed for 7.1 million dollars of additional funding to finance a further six months of relief operations in drought-stricken northeastern Uganda.
In a statement sent to AFP here, the WFP said that the funding would provide 12,000 tons of emergency food rations for 190,000 semi-nomadic people living in the Karamoja districts of Moroto and Kotido.
The people are suffering the consequences of widespread crop failure caused by the drought which has ravaged the Horn of Africa region.
The WFP has been feeding thousands of victims of the drought here since April, with the number peaking at 250,000 in July.
"WFP's intervention helped avert famine earlier this year, but the crisis in Karamoja is far from over," WFP's Great Lakes Regional Manager Bark Oborle said in the statement.
"This renewed food aid is absolutely essential to maintain the livelihood of thousands of needy people living in this region," the statement added.
Under the expanded relief operation, WFP will provide rations to the most vulnerable of the Karamojong people, who live along Kenya's western border, the statement said.
Male members of the Karamojong tribes typically migrate during the dry season from November to April, in search of water and pasture for their cattle. The severity of the drought this year forced them to start migrating in June.
The first phase of the WFP's emergency operations in Uganda received 3.9 million dollars, or 70 percent of the necessary funds, from the United States, Sweden and Switzerland -- NAIROBI (AFP)
© 2000 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
