Nearly 2,000 farmers in the southern regions of Welayeta and Gamo Gofa lost crops due to torrential rains, hailstorms and army worms, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in its weekly report.

Heavy rains also badly affected nearly 24,000 people in Shashego early this month, it said.

OCHA added that malnutrition remained a major concern in northern Amhara, Oromyia and Somali regions.

OCHA quoted the UN World Food Programme (WFP) as saying that up-coming shipments of cereals and blended food in July and August "will not be sufficient to meet estimated requirements."

The Ethiopian government and aid agencies estimate that 4.6 million people in the Horn of Africa country need emergency food aid worth US$325 million to tide them through to the next harvest in November. Donors have agreed to provide half, WFP says.

The dire conditions have revived memories of the country's 1984-1985 famine, which killed some 1 million people. Nearly 85 percent of Ethiopians rely on subsistence farming.

Aid agencies have also issued warnings this year about similar problems of drought and high food prices in neighbouring countries.

(For full Reuters coverage of Africa and to have your say on the top issues, visit http://africa.reuters.com/) (For more news and information on humanitarian issues visit www.alertnet.org) (Reporting by Tsegaye Tadesse, editing by Jack Kimball and Jon Boyle)