According to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO)—the world’s most authoritative weather source for governments, non-governmental organizations, and climate-sensitive sectors—there is an 80 to 90 percent likelihood that a ‘super strong’ El Niño weather event will take place in the coming weeks, with a 90 percent chance that it will continue into November.

An El Niño event will pose serious risks to vulnerable populations and climate-sensitive industries as it redirects normal weather patterns and exacerbates already present climate extremes. As the Secretary-General of the WMO stated, “We need to prepare for a potentially strong El Niño event—which will exacerbate drought and heavy rainfall and increase the risk of heatwaves both on land and in the ocean. The most recent El Niño, in 2023 through 2024, was one of the five strongest on record, and it played a role in the record global temperatures we saw in 2024.”

As the WMO explained, dry conditions in Central America, northern South America, the Caribbean, Indonesia, and southern Asia alongside higher rainfall in southern South America, the southern U.S., the horn of Africa, and central Asia are all typical of an El Niño event, but this year’s patterns are showing a high risk of drought in further areas that may already be struggling with food shortages. In particular, the Sahel, Southern Africa, South and Southeast Asia, the Caribbean, and Central America’s ‘dry corridor’ all face around a 50 percent chance of drought in the coming months. 

Much of these areas do not have the proper infrastructure to make up for the lack of rainfall that they would usually receive, and some, such as in the Sahel, are already suffering from water shortages and desertification without increased climate pressures. In addition, Sudan, South Sudan, Nigeria, Somalia, Haiti, Myanmar, and Mali, which are all in El Niño drought areas, have been included in the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)’s list of hunger hotspots for June to November 2026, which reports areas at highest risk for famine due to climate risks and political instability throughout that period. 

In the last ‘Super’ El Niño in 2016, record-breaking weather, including sixteen cyclones and a drought so bad in some places that the lowest returns on rainfall in 500 years were recorded, contributed to a global climate crisis. In the ‘Super’ El Niño prior, in 1998, estimated damages reached $5.7 trillion, concentrated in poverty-stricken tropical countries that didn’t have access to strong disaster relief networks. 

The UN’s FAO and World Food Program applied for $202 million in aid to help protect over 8.8 million people from the effects of the oncoming ‘Super’ El Niño, a number well below the amount needed to cover the total damage expected from this event, but with current regional conflict and international pressures against foreign aid, especially within the Trump Administration, there is serious doubt as to whether this aid will be delivered and how effectively it could be administered. As FAO Natural Resources Officer Jorge Alvar-Beltrán stated, “This isn’t like previous El Niños. The planet is much warmer today, and with conflict and food insecurity widespread, this new phase will hit hardest in places that are already vulnerable and have limited coping capacity,”

This year’s weather events are set to be some of the hardest hitting on record, but they might not slow down in years to come. As the experts have stated, the severity of these weather patterns will only increase with rising global temperatures, and as climate change increases, so will the frequency and magnitude of these rare super events. The UN Secretary-General, António Guterres, said it best: “The science is clear: El Niño is arriving on our doorstep in the coming months with 90 percent certainty. The world must treat it as the urgent climate warning it is. El Niño conditions will pour fuel on the fire of a warming world. Impacts will hit even harder, travel even farther, and cross borders with devastating speed. The only effective response is climate action equal to the crisis—ending the addiction to fossil fuels, accelerating the shift to renewables, protecting the most vulnerable, and delivering early warning systems for all.”