GENEROUS Dorset Echo readers have donated more than £1,300 to our appeal to help people suffering from severe food shortages in East Africa.

The appeal in conjunction with the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) East Africa Appeal aims to help people in Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia and the newly-formed Republic of South Sudan.

Victims have been left in need of food, water and emergency healthcare after the worst drought in 60 years devastated cattle and crops.

The problems are expected to be compounded by a poor coming harvest.

We have been receiving cheques ranging from £5 to £300 and every penny will make a difference.

Dorset Echo editor Toby Granville praised the generosity of readers.

He said: “Every time we ask our readers deliver. It is especially difficult in these austere times to ask people to give their hard-earned cash to help others but we are always grateful for every penny that our appeals raise.”

Brendan Gormley, chief executive of the DEC, the umbrella body representing the UK’s 14 leading aid agencies, said: “Desperation has forced thousands to leave their homes to seek help in the towns or camps, but some of the most vulnerable have been unable to make the long and arduous journey.

“Children and older people with weakened immune systems are often not strong enough to reach our agencies to access the care they need.

“In some areas of Borana in Ethiopia, for example, aid agencies report that the proportion of older people has risen from around five per cent to up to half the population. The more money we raise the more lives we can save in the short-term and the more help we can give people to rebuild their lives.”

Almost four in 10 (37 per cent) people have acute malnutrition in some parts of north-east Kenya, more than double the 15 per cent emergency threshold set by the World Health Organisation (WHO), says the DEC.

Unicef, one of the charities within the DEC, yesterday airlifted emergency nutrition supplies and water-related equipment to Baidoa in southern Somalia to assist children and more supplies are en route.

More than half a million children in Somalia are acutely malnourished and in urgent need of humanitarian assistance, the charity said.

Donations reached the landmark £15m figure as the City of London Corporation revealed it had donated £25,000 to the British Red Cross’s East Africa Food Crisis Appeal.

How you can donate

• By cheque: You can send a cheque made payable to to ‘DEC East Africa Crisis Appeal’ and drop it to any Dorset Echo office or send in the post to – The famine appeal, Newsdesk, Dorset Echo, Fleet House, Hampshire Road, Weymouth, Dorset, DT4 9XD.

• IF you would like to help in any other way please call the Newsdesk on 01305 830995.