The assistance will provide free rice, seed and fertiliser to 500,000 Cambodians, the poorest of the poor among the country's 14 million people, the bank said.

The recipients include slum residents in the capital Phnom Penh and farmers in seven provinces around the country's Tonle Sap lake.

'When the food price inflation spike came these communities were already in a fragile state. It drove them more sharply over the edge into food poverty,' said Mr Arun Goswani, the bank's country director.

The scheme will run through September 2011.

Over the past year rice prices in Cambodia have doubled, the ADB said in a statement.

It added that the price of meat and fish has risen 30 to 50 per cent, and farmers have been hit hard by an almost tripling in fertiliser prices.

About one-in-three Cambodians live below the national poverty line of just 45 US cents a day.

Mr Mahfuz Ahmed, the bank official in charge of the food project, said that of Cambodia's 14 million people, about 2.6 million sometimes go hungry and suffer from malnutrition.

The bank said half the aid will be in grant form and the other half is a loan carrying an interest of one per cent per year.

The project will also provide free breakfasts and take-home rations for poor children in primary schools. -- AP