Thousands of prisoners skipped their annual New Year's lunch yesterday and instead sent the food to hundreds of thousands of Kenyans affected by food shortages.

Most of the country's estimated 50,000 prisoners gave up their ration of beans and stiff porridge made from maize on the day that President Mwai Kibaki declared the food shortages a national disaster in an attempt to speed up relief efforts.

Prisoners wanted to help after watching starving Kenyans on television, reading about food shortages in newspapers and discussing the situation with visiting relatives.