SEOUL (AFP) -- Time is running out to avert a humanitarian tragedy in North Korea due to acute food shortages, a United Nations agency warned.

""The food security situation... is clearly bad and getting worse,"" said Tony Banbury, the World Food Program's (WFP) Asia director.
""It is increasingly likely that external assistance will be urgently required to avert a serious tragedy,"" he said in a statement.
The WFP estimates that even now more than 6.5 million people, out of a population of 23 million, do not have enough to eat. It said the figure would rise unless urgent action is taken.
Thirty-seven percent of young children are already chronically malnourished and one third of mothers are malnourished and anemic, the WFP said, quoting the last major survey by UN agencies.
Banbury called on international donors to increase aid, and urged North Korea to allow aid agencies to check that food is reaching the needy.
South Korean officials said in February that some of Seoul's rice aid intended for hungry civilians had been diverted to frontline army units.
The hardline communist state suffered famine in the mid to late 1990s which killed hundreds of thousands. It has relied on international aid since then, but in 2006 ordered the WFP drastically to cut back its operations.
The UN agency said severe floods last summer had brought increased urgency to the long-standing problem of chronic food shortages.
It said prices of staples in the capital Pyongyang had doubled over the past year and are now at their highest recorded levels since 2004.
One kilogram (2.2 pounds) of rice now costs a third of an average worker's monthly salary.
The rapid rise confirms fears that the nation ""may suffer deeper and more widespread hunger this year,"" said Jean-Pierre de Margerie, WFP country director based in Pyongyang, in the statement.
""Now it takes a third of a month's salary just to buy a few days' worth of rice. Families and especially vulnerable persons will suffer from lack of access to food, eat fewer meals and have a poorer diet, increasing their vulnerability to diseases and illness,"" de Margerie said.
The UN's Food and Agricultural Organization forecasts a 2008 food shortfall of 1.66 million tons, a near doubling of the 2007 deficit and the highest since 2001.
The WFP said that according to the North's statistics, the floods reduced the rice harvest by 25 percent and maize by 33 percent.
South Korea is the largest donor to the WFP's current program in North Korea, with 20 million dollars. It also provides huge amounts of rice and fertilizer in bilateral aid annually.
But Pyongyang has so far not asked Seoul for aid amid rising cross-border tensions. The North is angry at the new government's policy of linking economic aid -- but not humanitarian assistance -- to denuclearization.
The food shortage is so severe that even elite citizens in the capital have had state rations cut off, South Korea's Good Friends aid group said this month.
""WFP takes the situation very seriously and we will be intensifying discussions with the DPRK (North Korean) government and major donors that have indicated a willingness to provide food aid to the DPRK,"" said Banbury.