A coordinated plan of five ministries to accelerate the reduction of maternal and child under-nutrition in the country is taking pace, officials said.

National Planning Commission has recently prepared a six-year plan to improve the nutrition of babies up to two years of age through the coordinated efforts of the ministries of health, education, agriculture, local development and physical planning and works.

The UN warns that a million children in Africa's Sahel region face malnutrition due to drought in region. In all 15 million people face food insecurity in eight nations across the Sahel, a region that is still recovering from drought and a food crisis of 2010. Un some countries the situation is worsened by conflict.

At least 26 people were killed and more than 100 missing after flash floods hit a wedding party and three villages in northern Afghanistan, an official said Monday.

Most of the victims were women and children as the floods, caused by heavy rains, swept through areas of Deh Mardan district in Sari Pul province, said Fazlullah Sadat, head of the provincial disaster management authority.

“We have found 26 bodies mostly women and children — and more than 100 others are still missing,” he told AFP.

New Delhi In a bid to reduce pilferage of grain, food ministry and UN body World Food Programme (WFP) on Friday signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for scaling up the modernisation of Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS).

WFP, which is currently supporting a pilot project in Orissa’s Rayagada districts, where biometrics based technology is used to eliminate ‘bogus’ BPL card holders, would support other states such as Bihar, Jharkhand and North-eastern states in taking up modernisation of TPDS.

Global food prices rose in March for a third straight month with more hikes to come, the UN's food agency said on Thursday, adding to fears of hunger and a new wave of social unrest in poor countries.

Record high prices for staple foods last year were one of the main factors that contributed to the Arab Spring uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa, as well as bread riots in other parts of the world.

The cost of food has risen again this year after coming down from a February 2011 record peak.

Conflict, population displacement and high food prices mean millions of people in South Sudan face hunger this year, two U.N. food agencies said on Wednesday.

The number of people with insecure food supplies has risen to 4.7 million in 2012 from 3.3 million in 2011, a report by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and World Food Programme (WFP) said.

Of those, about one million people are severely food insecure, and that number could double if fighting continues and prices keep rising, the report said.

The Department for International Development of the United Kingdom and the United Nations World Food Programme will provide much-needed support for 150,000 people affected by recent floods and water-logging in Satkhira.

The donation of £440,000 ($679,000) will support displaced women, men and children by providing a one-off cash grant of Tk 1,500 to each affected household, designed to cover food needs for one month.

The cash can be used to buy essential foods and other items, and in the process stimulate local markets, said a WFP press release on Monday.

Brazil is a world leader in the fight against hunger and its experience can be shared with other countries, visiting World Food Program chief Josette Sheeran said Monday.

"As a world champion in the fight against hunger, Brazil has a wealth of experience that can be shared with governments eager to learn how they achieved that success and adapt it to their own countries," she noted.

The UN official made the remarks in the northeastern city of Salvador while inaugurating a local branch of a newly established Center of Excellence Against Hunger based in Brasilia.

World Food Programme (WFP) is facing a critical shortfall of $109 million for floods operation in Sindh and Balochistan, WFP spokesman Amjad Jamal told APP on Friday.

“WFP has only supplies to continue distributions in flood-hit areas until the end of November, leaving no option but to cut the ration numbers of beneficiaries from December,” he added.

Responding positively to the United Nations appeal, the Netherlands provided humanitarian assistance worth four million euro to the flood victims of Sindh.

The amount would be utilised for purchasing and transporting food items to the flood-hit areas with the collaboration of the World Food Programme. The amount provided by the Netherlands is in addition to the 400,000 euros contribution of the country to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) for the purpose.