Bahrain and the Gulf are unlikely to be able to prevent the devastating effects of rising food prices, said a UN World Food Programme official.

The organisation's Cairo-based deputy regional director for the Middle East, Central Asia and Eastern Europe Philip Ward said the soaring cost of living had already pushed millions into poverty and sparked riots.

He said while the Gulf countries had benefited from increased oil revenues, those with high food import costs were most at risk of encountering problems.

'Worldwide 100 million people are at risk of poverty as a result of high food prices,' Ward told delegates attending the UN Economic and Social Council (Ecosoc) annual ministerial review meeting on Sustainable Urbanisation.

'In the Middle East, six per cent of people in Yemen have fallen into poverty as a result of high food prices.

'You also have the increased risk of social tension and we have seen violence in some parts of the region, particularly Egypt.

'People are living on less than $1 a day and people spend 50 per cent of their income on food - they now face having to spend much more of their income on food, which has in some cases doubled.

'People are skipping meals and eating less nutritious food and children are being taken out of school so that they can work and bring additional income to the family.'

Ward later told the Gulf Daily News, our sister publication, that while people living in the Gulf were generally able to absorb the impact more easily than poorer countries, the threat of poverty remained.

'I do not doubt there are people in the region enduring hardships,' he said. 'The poorest people living on the edge may well be pushed into poverty.'

'They may already be starting to cut back on meals and eating less nutritious food such as meat, dairy products and vegetables.

'That has big repercussions, not only causing immediate malnutrition but also on long-term health.'

Ward expects food prices to eventually fall and stabilise, but says they will be much higher than they were before the first substantial price rises began in 2004.-TradeArabia News Service