By Aamer Ahmed Khan BBC News, Neelum Valley, Pakistan-administered Kashmir

Food demand is far outstripping supply

This is the second in a series of reports from the Neelum valley, one of the areas rendered most inaccessible after the South Asian earthquake.

"Major Shakeel is in charge of food distribution here," says Malik Wilayat.

"He is a good man, he makes sure that everyone gets something."

"Oh yeah?" jeers the man sitting next to him.

"I was given a handful of rations eight days ago and have not received anything else since."

Six weeks after the 8 October earthquake in northern Pakistan, food remains a subject of intense discussion in the Neelum Valley.

Sharp decline

Along the road from Muzaffarabad, with its food glut, to the valley beyond the first major road block, it is extremely hard to find freshly cooked food.

Cooking facilities were destroyed in the earthquake and cooking fuel is hard to come by.

Neelum Valley 1: Still cut off

The only edibles are in the shape of dry rations being doled out at relief centres set up by the army.

Even these are in seriously short supply, as private donations that poured in for the first few days have almost completely dried up.

According to official figures, more than 700 metric tons of food were delivered to the quake-affected areas in the first five days after 8 October by private domestic donors.

International aid accounted for another 330 tons.

The domestic aid graph then went into a sharp decline as the emphasis shifted to shelter and medical supplies.

Over the past three weeks, the figure has hovered around 20 tons.

Senior government officials say their resources are spread so thin that they need maximum assistance from private donors and international agencies such as the Red Cross or the World Food Programme.

Both moved into the valley in a major way last.

With two of the world's largest relief agencies now involved in the area, the situation must surely improve.

But to what extent?

Helicopter constraints

Here is some simple food arithmetic.

The Neelum valley has a population of about 160,000 - three-quarters of which is concentrated in a 50km stretch, called lower Neelam, from Muzaffarabad onwards.

Food distribution creates unease between locals and the army

The locally available ration requirement calculated on the basis of 12.5kg of mixed foodstuff per person per month comes to 2,000 tons a month.

With the weather closing in, an estimated 10,000 tons is required to help the residents of lower Neelam through the harsh Himalayan winter.

Compare this now to the delivery capability available to the entire relief machinery.

Apart from the two Russian MI-26s - each capable of carrying up to 20 tons at a time - US and British Chinooks are carrying out the bulk of the relief effort.

But the stated capacity of 15 tons per Chinook operated on a typical day is limited by weather, weight, height of the terrain and space constraints.

More importantly, given that an estimated 23,000 of the 25,000 houses in lower Neelam have been completely destroyed, the Chinooks cannot just carry food.

Tents, blankets, medical supplies - and also feeding the needs of international medical and relief agencies operating in the forward areas - accounts for a large part of their delivery capacity.

Further, damage to access routes that link villagers to the 14 distribution points set up in the valley, has turned delivery to end users into a slow and painful process.

Sardines, gherkins and panties

The situation is compounded by a problematic communication infrastructure that the field commanders in the forward areas have to deal with.

Supply bases and the front line have communication problems

It is often not possible for them to direct the supply bases in Rawalpindi and Muzaffarabad to send precisely what is required.

"We often do not know what we have received till we actually open the cartons," says one military official at Dhanni - a military relief camp at the top end of lower Neelam.

Young officers still laugh remembering the day when rations had reached critically low levels.

Of the supplies delivered to them that day, two large cartons were found full of bras and panties.

"The soldiers who opened the cartons were so rattled at the sight that they didn't even know what to tell their superiors," laughs one officer.

Military culture in particular is very conservative in such matters.

Unlike in Western culture, women's undergarments are meant to remain unseen - not publicly displayed or disbursed.

Relief supplies often include goods that are not useful

It took two red-faced junior officers the rest of the day to find women in neighbouring villages who eventually managed to distribute the undergarments.

Another Chinook-load contained sardines.

"The people they were distributed to were again lined up the next day complaining that they had been given 'rotten fish so bad that some of it had turned to oil'," says an officer.

At times, even excellent quality beef, clearly marked halal, was turned down by the recipients because it was delivered by the Americans, such is the mistrust of the United States here.

The availability of the right kind of rations in adequate quantities and the necessarily slow process of distribution means that the 160,000 residents of the valley may remain on a drip feed throughout the winter.

"This is an extremely uneasy situation for us," says a top army commander in the valley.