The United Nations is asking the international community to provide US$550 million for quake relief efforts in Haiti, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Friday.

"Most of this money will go to urgent needs -- food and water are in critically short supply," Ban told reporters at UN Headquarters.

"Given the number of people in the streets without homes, we must provide shelter. We need tents and more tents," he said. "We also need more medical supplies and even more medical personnel."

The secretary-general said "a high proportion of 3 million people" in the capital area of Port au Prince are without access to food, water, shelter and electricity."

The UN chief touted the international community's "generous and robust" response.

"A major humanitarian effort is well underway. We are mobilizing resources as fast as we possibly can," he said.

He noted that a UN operations center has been established in Port au Prince Airport, coordinating the efforts of "two dozen" rescue teams that have arrived from around the world.

Due to the lack of heavy lifting equipment and "extremely difficult logistics," search and rescue remains a "monumental effort", he said.

Preliminary estimates show "widespread damage" to infrastructure in Port au Prince and other affected areas, with as many as 50 percent of buildings in the worst-hit areas damaged or destroyed, he said.

Ban said he is sending Assistant Secretary-General Tony Banbury of the Department of Field Support to Haiti to serve as his deputy special representative to Haiti.

Edmond Mulet, Ban's acting special representative to Haiti and assistant-secretary-general for peacekeeping operations, has arrived in Port au Prince and assumed full command of the UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH).

"I myself will go to Haiti very soon, both to show solidarity with the people of Haiti and our UN staff and to assess the situation for myself," Ban announced, adding that there is still no "exact timing" for this upcoming visit.

(Xinhua News Agency January 16, 2009)