Seven months ago, El Niño was a distant, diffuse threat: it did not exist. It existed as a forecast, as a possibility, as a reminder of a phenomenon that has been coming and going for 10,000 years. But, of course, that was December 2025.
Now El Niño is not only here. According to NOAA, 81% is one of the largest since 1950. If the world has a problem, Latin America has it raised to the nth degree.
But you’re getting ready, right? For example, and this is a great example, the Panama Canal Authority began to ‘save water’ in the Gatún Reservoir weeks ago. It’s not an occurrence. Historically, El Niño drastically reduces rainfall in the Panama area and this usually causes a severe deficit of fresh water in the swamps that feed the lock system of the interoceanic waterway. Without that water, the canal becomes inoperative.
In other words, that water is crucial
And that’s why I say that the Canal is a good example. Because it is not that Latin America is not preparing: it is that the calculations are not working out.
But… let’s start at the beginning. On July 9, NOAA upped the ante and announced that its models gave a 81% of possibilities that El Niño will be “very strong” already between October and December. That would place it among the largest since 1950. In addition, he believes that there is a 97% chance that it will last until the spring of 2027. But surely none of these are the most worrying sign.
Above all, if we look at the coast of Peru and Ecuador. The anomaly off this coast is 2.2 degrees above that of the western Pacific. This is reminiscent of 1982-83 and 1997-98 (the worst recent ENSOs) and not 2015-16. And, as it could not be otherwise, the authorities know it.
Nobody is sitting idly by. Peru has in alert Since March, the Red Cross had been preparing since AprilEcuador presented his plan on July 1st. However, it is not enough.
The director general of IICA, Muhammad Ibrahim, published these days a grandstand calling for a “proactive regional strategy” in the face of an episode that is increasingly clear will be historic. And it does so because the level of preparation seems clearly insufficient.
And, be careful, it is not a reproach. It is more of a symptom. Even when we prepare we are late: the consequences (added to a fertilizer crisis that does not end) are going to be very serious. Above all, because not even the strongest events produce the typical impact everywhere: they only indicate probabilities and we do not have a system capable of preparing for all scenarios.
But we should have it.
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