Poor rains and high crop prices have left more than 18 million people with serious food shortages in 10 African countries, a food security monitoring group said.

Diminishing water supplies and dry pastures also were fuelling conflict among rival tribes, and child malnutrition was reportedly rising in parts the Greater Horn of Africa region, the US-funded Famine Early Warning Systems Network said in a report released late on Tuesday, China Daily reported today.

The food shortages were concentrated in Ethiopia, where more than half of the 18 million affected people lived, the report said. At least half of neighboring Eritrea's population of 4.5 million was in peril, as well as 2.69 million in Uganda, the report said.

Other countries affected included Sudan, Djibouti, Rwanda, Tanzania, Kenya, Burundi and Somalia, it said.

"In agricultural areas, rainfall performance and crop prospects are mixed," the report said. "Crop production in eastern and coastal areas of the (region) will be below average, due to insufficient and poorly distributed rainfall."

Members of cattle herding communities "continue to be the most food insecure and vulnerable group," according to the report.

Meanwhile, aid workers have warned that the costs of saving millions of people starving in Niger are rocketing because rich nations ignored calls for early intervention to avert the ravages of last year's drought.

"The funding needs are sky-rocketing because it's a matter of saving lives," said Gian Carlo Cirri, the UN World Food Programme's representative in Niger's capital Niamey.

(China Daily July 21, 2005)