Experts are warning this El Niño is colliding with something far bigger than weather
· The South African
Most coverage of this year’s El Niño has focused on heat, drought, and rainfall.
According to the World Economic Forum, that framing risks dangerous complacency, because in its view, this El Niño isn’t arriving in isolation.
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Why the WEF is drawing this connection
The WEF’s analysis argues that this El Niño is developing at a time of elevated global conflict levels, war-related fuel and fertiliser shortages, and critical mineral restrictions.
Its case isn’t that El Niño causes these pressures, it’s that the timing matters: when a major climate event lands alongside existing global strain, the WEF warns the combined effect could become what it calls a genuine systemic shock.
The WEF’s core argument: crises don’t stay in their own lane
Their central warning is blunt: crises no longer arrive neatly, one at a time, they argue.
Instead, the WEF says they overlap, compound, and amplify each other, often while the political systems meant to absorb them have less spare capacity than in past years.
A climate shock landing on top of existing conflict and supply pressure doesn’t just add to the load, the WEF argues.
It can multiply it.
The forecast confidence behind the underlying event
Whatever view you take of the WEF’s broader argument, the El Niño forecast itself is on solid ground.
NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center put the odds of El Niño starting between May and July 2026 above 80%.
It also gave a 96% probability that it persists into early 2027.
The WEF isn’t disputing the forecast, its argument is about how seriously the knock-on consequences are being taken.
It’s actually a sobering thought to sit with. This isn’t just another hot, dry summer story, but one landing at a particularly strained moment globally.
It has me concerned, and reading through the comment section on our previous pieces, it seems like a lot of you are starting to grasp the severity of this too.
Do you find the WEF’s warning convincing, or does it feel like it’s reading too much into the timing?
Let us know in the comments below, Mzansi…