• El Niño provides valuable early warning opportunities, allowing FEWS NET to predict climate impacts and food security risks months in advance.
• The current El Niño is expected to keep global food assistance needs high, with up to 110 million people across 31 countries requiring support through 2024.
• While some regions may benefit from increased rainfall, others, especially Southern Africa and Latin America, are likely to face worsening drought, poor harvests, and rising food insecurity.

As the ongoing El Niño is expected to continue gaining strength in the coming months, the Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) is using scientific insights from previous El Niño years to predict how the climate phenomenon will affect food security.

In a Global Alert earlier this month, FEWS NET explains that, while projected impacts of the 2023-24 El Niño will vary by region, global food assistance needs are likely to remain high as the climate phenomenon dissipates by mid-2024.

“El Niño provides important opportunities for FEWS NET scenario development,” Laura Harrison with the UCSB Climate Hazards Center said. “El Niño modifies global atmospheric circulation in ways that make certain areas more likely to experience seasonal climate extremes. Since El Niños are predicted at relatively long lead times, these areas can be identified long in advance and then closely monitored using the latest observations and model forecasts.”

These long lead predictions of climate and weather patterns allow FEWS NET analysts to make early forecasts of acute food insecurity, supporting program planners, implementers, and policymakers to take early action. 

“It is an ‘evidence relay’ that translates and transmits critical information from climate scientists to food security analysts, and then on to decision makers, providing the robust foundation for actions taken to save lives and livelihoods,” FEWS NET Team Leader Kiersten Johnson said.

According to its latest projections, FEWS NET anticipates that up to 110 million people across 31 countries will need food assistance through 2024 as El Niño contributes to already significant levels of acute food insecurity. 

Concern is particularly high for regions including Southern Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) where El Niño is likely to contribute to an increase in food assistance needs. El Niño events typically result in drier- and hotter-than-normal conditions in both regions.

As previous years have shown, below-average rainfall and increased temperatures associated with El Niño can cause harvests in Southern Africa and LAC to underperform, leading to staple food item deficits and price spikes.

Meanwhile, FEWS NET has projected a decrease in food assistance needs in the eastern Horn of Africa and Afghanistan – two regions impacted by recent multi-year droughts – as El Niño is expected to bring above-average precipitation.

“The combination of very warm sea surface temperatures and wind patterns during positive Indian Ocean Dipole events, in tandem with El Niño conditions, supports strong predictions for wet conditions during late 2023,” Harrison explained.

While FEWS NET expects increased rains to aid drought recovery in some areas of the eastern Horn, concern is high for riverine and low-lying areas that could face short-term population displacement, crop damage, and disease as a result of flooding from extreme rainfall.

FEWS NET's long-lead forecasts for life-saving food security projections demonstrate the critical value of investing in climate science for the well-being of people around the world. FEWS NET will continue to track the ongoing El Niño and provide updates on food security outcomes in the countries and regions it monitors. 

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