workers carry packages of wheat from USAID
"We have ordered quantities of imported grains totalling almost half a million tons that will meet the needs of the country," he said, adding: "One hundred tonnes of wheat will arrive in March, in addition to 20,000 tonnes imported from India."

Hamid affirmed that the government was "able to fill the food gap," and blamed the food shortage "on little rainfall during the last (cropping) season and the rise of grain prices."

Meanwhile, Hamid has rejected statements attributed to UN secretary-general Kofi Annan on the current situation in Sudan's war-affected western Darfur region and southern Sudan to the effect that conditions had not improved much and that relief workers encounter difficulties attempting to gain access to the needy.

The Sudanese minister noted that Annan's statements were contrary to those of his representative to Sudan, Jan Pronk, who had said the "situation in the Darfur states has improved".

Hamid said the humanitarian conditions in southern Sudan, which just ended a 21-year rebel war against Khartoum, have improved following cessation of hostilities and that "humanitarian aid has been flowing smoothly" to the region.

The Darfur region has been in the grip of fighting between government forces and two rebel groups for the past two years, uprooting over one million people from their homes and claiming some 70,000 lives, according to estimates from the UN and relief agencies.

The African Union is attempting to broker a peace deal among the parties at peace talks in the Nigerian capital, Abuja.