Record El Nino Threatens Asia's Harvests and Global Food Prices

A strengthening El Nino is on track to become the most intense on record, with forecasters warning it will bring severe drought to Asia and extreme weather worldwide, endangering food supplies for millions of people.

The climate pattern, marked by unusually warm surface waters in the Pacific Ocean, recurs every few years and reshapes weather across the globe. This year's event is forecast to peak in December. The United Kingdom's national weather and climate service has described it as potentially the strongest in living memory, while the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration puts the odds at 69% that it will be the most powerful since record-keeping began in 1950.

Global oceans already set new temperature records in August, said Kareff Rafisura, who heads the disaster risk reduction division at the U.N. Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific.

Southeast Asia, among the world's most climate-vulnerable regions, is feeling the strain early. Wildfires are burning farmland and peatlands in Indonesia and sending toxic haze across the region. Water levels at a major reservoir serving Jakarta, home to some 42 million people, are falling steadily, exposing the ruins of a village once submerged beneath it. Fish catches are declining.

The region is also contending with an energy crisis set off by the war in Iran. Governments that have dipped into financial reserves to cushion higher energy costs and scarce fertilizer now have less room to respond to the drought, said Paul Teng of Singapore's ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute. "El Nino is only compounding all the other problems that we see," he said.

Erma Yulihastin of Indonesia's Research Center for Climate and Atmosphere cautioned that the phenomenon has only begun its "super phase."

Pressure is building on agriculture and fisheries. The Mekong basin, shared by six countries and already disrupted by mining and hydropower dams, is seeing lower flows that make fishing and farming harder for riverside communities, said Kongmeng Ly of the Mekong River Commission. Zeb Hogan of the University of Nevada, Reno, who leads the Wonders of the Mekong project, warned that without relief the river may no longer sustain people as it once did.

Southeast Asia's wet season normally runs from June to October, refilling reservoirs and supplying irrigation before the next planting. Drought could force farmers to delay planting, cut acreage or switch crops, Rafisura said. "Agriculture is definitely on the front line."

The world's three largest rice exporters — India, Vietnam and Thailand — are among the countries most exposed. North of Bangkok, farmer Boonmark Marksuuk, 55, is already pumping water into his fields because he no longer trusts the rain, while paying more for fuel and fertilizer. Indonesia and Malaysia, which together supply about 85% of global palm oil, are also bracing for impact. Malaysia's prime minister has directed the agriculture ministry to find ways to soften the blow, with the country expected to be hit hardest in November. Eddy Martono, chairman of the Indonesian Palm Oil Association, said farmers who rely on rain to work fertilizer into the soil will stop applying it if the rains fail, hurting national output.

The U.N. World Food Program estimates the event could push at least 49 million more people into acute food insecurity by the end of 2027, with Central America and southern Africa worst affected and significant fallout expected in eastern Africa and South and Southeast Asia.

Goldman Sachs analysts estimate global food commodity prices could rise more than 15%. HSBC's Global Investment Research notes that losses from past El Nino events have run into the trillions of dollars and could be larger this time.

"Whatever happens to agriculture really determines whether people stay below or just slightly above the poverty line," Rafisura said, adding that how well Southeast Asian countries protect production will carry consequences far beyond the region.