Shugri Farah cradles and rocks her six-month-old son Kayt, brushing away the flies that buzz incessantly around them. She does what little she can to help him, but what he really needs is food, and that she cannot give.

She looks far from healthy herself, but unlike little Kayt she has more than just skin on her bones and more than the last flicker of life in her eyes.

Shugri Farah lost a daughter to starvation last month as three years of consecutive drought began to take its toll on the people of south-eastern Ethiopia. Now she is preparing herself for the death of her son.

An estimated 70% of the 3.5m people living in the region are nomadic. Even at the best of times they live on the very edge. They build up their herds of livestock during the good times, and trek this barren and seemingly inhospitable land in search of pasture and water.

They have lived like this for centuries and have adapted to the harshness of their environment.

Their herds - composed of sheep, goats camels and, increasingly cattle, which bring in the most profit but are less drought-resistant - enable them to cope when the rains fail.

But after three years without rain their animals have died or been sold to buy food. With their assets gone, many of them are migrating to the area's towns, their survival dependent on the goodwill of the outside world.

In Armale, 25 miles north of Gode, the waterholes on the edge of the village have been dry for longer than 33-year-old Ahmed Aideed can remember. 'It is bad here,' he said. 'Very bad.'

His wife Halima gave birth to twins two months ago but stopped lactating a week ago. The little water that her husband is able to salvage from the dirty puddles that remain is the twin's only source of sustenance.

This is a pattern repeated throughout the region as reports come in from one village after another of desperate people subsisting on the last of their resources and in urgent need of help.

Aid agencies plan to set up supplementary feeding centres right across the area but the inhabitants of villages like Armale, which is not served by the main road, fear that they will be forgotten by the relief effort.

'Everything is lost. We have nothing left and if God doesn't help us then we will die,' said Mr Aideed.

These fears are further compounded by a deep concern that chronic insecurity in the region will further delay the prompt delivery of emergency aid.

Rebel fighters

The insecurity is mainly caused by the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF), which is fighting a secessionist campaign against the government. The group is not a serious threat to the state but it is capable of discriminatory acts of banditry designed to keep its fighters alive and the campaign going.

The presence of armed ONLF fighters and Somali bandits competing for the same resources as the hungry is of great concern to the international aid agencies.

There have been 17 serious incidents involving aid agencies operating in the region since last August. Bandits have ambushed aid convoys, drivers have been killed and aid workers kidnapped.

One international aid worker, who asked not to be identified, said that the Ethiopian government was opposed to a large international aid presence in the area, despite the crisis.

'They are very worried that if there are any serious incidents involving foreign aid workers then the agencies would withdraw en masse, which could jeopardise the whole relief effort.'

'Due to insecurity United Nations staff members are not allowed to stay more than a few hours on the ground and cannot travel overland from one village to the next,' said Roberta Rossi, a spokeswoman for the World Food Programme (WFP).

'This means we depend on local aid organisations and have very little first- hand information.'

The WFP says there is enough relief food in the pipeline to meet the needs of the affected areas until the end of July, but the long-term prognosis for the people of the Ogaden and other drought-stricken areas of the country depends on how quickly the newly pledged aid gets into the country.

WFP, in conjunction with the Ethiopian government, is currently conducting a new assessment of the Ogaden to estab lish how many people are at risk and it expects the number to be even higher than the previous estimate of 1.2m people.

The future for Ethiopians like Ahmed Aideed, his wife and their newborn twins, and millions of other people in the country, now lies with the international relief effort, and the speed with which the relief organisations can act on their promises.