U.S. says more needed to help Africa's hungry

[Eugene]

U.S. says more needed to help Africa's hungry
11 Aug 2005 17:00:36 GMT
Source: Reuters

By Sue Pleming

WASHINGTON, Aug 11 (Reuters) - More than 20 million people in 12
African countries, from Niger in the west to Zimbabwe in the south,
face serious food shortages and donor nations must do more to ease the
crisis, said U.S. aid officials on Thursday.

In its latest report, the U.S. government-funded Famine Early Warning
Systems Network lists 12 African countries where more than 20 million
people get food aid and stamped "emergency" alert status on six of
those -- Chad, Ethiopia, Niger, Somalia, southern Sudan and Zimbabwe.

Overall, nearly 35 million people were at risk in those 12 nations,
said the network, which tracks "food insecurity" in 20 African
countries as well as in Afghanistan and Haiti.

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Africa was under the spotlight at the G8 summit in Scotland last month
when the world's industrialized nations agreed to more than double aid
to Africa but critics doubt all those pledges will materialize. The
continent will also be the focus at the UN millennium summit in New
York next month.

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