Affected by a severe drought, Zimbabwe now has 4 million people who need food aid, a cabinet minister said, raising the figure from a previous estimate of 3 million.

"Indications are that the figure of vulnerable households requiring food assistance could be as high as four million people," Public Service, Labor and Social Welfare Minister Prisca Mupfumira was quoted as saying by the state-run newspaper the Herald.

Zimbabwe and the entire southern Africa region has been hit by an El-Nino induced drought and the Zimbabwe government last month appealed for 1.6 billion U.S. dollars to buy maize to feed the affected people.

The drought has also killed thousands of livestock in the country.

Mupfumira said government had about 91,000 tonnes of maize stocks as of March 10, enough to last three months.

The minister also warned officials against distributing food on partisan lines.

The United Nations last week said it had raised 76 million U.S. dollars for Zimbabwe's food aid out of a targeted 130 million dollars.

The world body said it had also reached more than one million people affected by hunger in Zimbabwe and pledged to scale-up relief activities for the food insecure. Endit

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