The joint appeal from UN agencies, the Ethiopian government and private relief agencies is the largest for food and non-food items since the impoverished Horn of Africa nation was last struck by a drought emergency in 2003, officials said.

Some 1.7 million Ethiopians, most of them in the country's southeast and east, are among up to 11 million people throughout four nations in the region in dire need of food assistance to survive, the United Nations has said. Another 2.6 million Ethiopians face chronic food shortages.

"Already we have an emerging crisis in the pastoral regions of Ethiopia with about 1.7 million people facing food insecurity and requiring assistance," said Bjorn Ljungqvist, the Ethiopia country director of the UN children's agency UNICEF and the coordinator of the appeal.

Of the total amount being asked for, about 10 million dollars (8.2 million euros) "is needed immediately to respond to this drought related emergency," he said, adding that 67 percent, or 111 million dollars (91.5 euros), of the requested aid would go to non-food health, nutrition, water and sanitation programs.

In addition to the drought, Ethiopia, along with other east African nations, faces a very real prospect of the emergence of a deadly strain of bird flu that has killed around 80 people since 2003, mostly in Asia, but also recently in Turkey on the edge of Europe, raising fears it could spread.

"The threat of avian influenza reaching Ethiopia's borders is another serious concern requiring preparedness at all levels in order to rapidly detect the virus's introduction into the country and minimise its spread in the case of its occurrence," the UN appeal said.

Ethiopia, along with the Rift Valley countries of Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, is considered particularly at risk for outbreaks of the disease, which experts say could have a devastating effect in Africa where veterinary services and human health care are poor.

Ethiopia is also battling to contain malaria, measles and meningitis and may face a number of unpredictable disasters including floods and and locusts, the UN appeal said.

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