KAMPALA, Oct. 29(Xinhuanet)-- The United Nations World Food Program(WFP) plans to buy 60,000 tons of food worth 12 million US dollars in the next five months from Uganda, the UN food aid organization has said.

WFP country director Ken Davies was quoted by local press on Saturday as saying that the UN organization purchases half of the food for its operations from Uganda.

Davies said since January, they had bought over 120,000 tons offood worth 31 million dollars from local traders and farmers.

"We distributed 92,500 tons of food in Uganda and 26,000 tons in the Great Lakes region," he said.

Davies said they recently concluded a 6.8 million dollars relief operation in Karamoja where half of the pastoralists were hit by drought earlier this year.

He said they were working with partners to develop the ability of farmers groups to participate in the commercial market.

WFP is the world's largest humanitarian organization and the UNfrontline agency in the fight against global hunger. In 2004, the agency fed 113 million people in 80 country.

In Uganda alone, it aims to assist more than 3 million people in 2005, including 1.45 million internally displaced persons, 164,000 refugees, 500,000 drought affected pastoralists in Karamoja, 145,000 malnourished children, 14,000 street children, 100,000 HIV/AIDS affected people, 430,000 school children and 300,000 involvedin asset-creation in post-conflict areas. Enditem