<\/p>\n
Forecasters are warning that the El Ni\u00f1o weather pattern, which often drives severe droughts, flooding and storms in Africa, could turn into one of the strongest \u200cever seen if current Pacific Ocean warming trends continue.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
As well as the threat to food and water security, government finances and banking sectors could also be undermined if disasters damage infrastructure and leave cash-strapped countries struggling to repay the connected loans.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
“Just this event is going to reduce heavily affected countries’ GDP by 1% to 2% on average, which is about $10 billion to $20 billion across the continent,” Anthony Nyong, the AfDB’s Director for Climate Change \u200band Green Growth, said in an interview.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The AfDB’s most recent forecasts in May predicted Africa as a whole would see 4.2% economic growth this year, rising to 4.4% \u200bin 2027 assuming the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran eases.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
That, however, was before forecasts of a “super” or “Godzilla” El Ni\u00f1o were made.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Nyong’s estimate of the likely $10 \u2060to $20 billion hit is the first given by a major multilateral development bank in relation to El Ni\u00f1o. He did not provide a country-by-country breakdown of the estimate but warned it was \u200bunlikely to be a one-off either.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Drought conditions, which much of the Sahel region has been suffering from in recent years, may persist, while Mozambique’s experiences after Cyclone Idai in 2019 show it \u200bcan take years to recover from major storms.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Governments were also getting snared in what Nyong described as the “climate finance trap”, where they lack the resources to respond to crises and are forced to raid health, education or infrastructure budgets to meet the costs.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The 2023 to 2024 El Ni\u00f1o event caused severe drought in Southern Africa and heavy rains and flooding in East Africa. These conditions led to widespread crop failures, surging food prices and record-breaking sea-level spikes along the continent’s coastlines.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The AfDB has estimated Africa’s farmers are already facing nearly $330 million in lost income this year, while fishing industries could be hit hard too due \u200bto rising sea temperatures and storms.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
“When these shocks happen, countries take two steps back,” Nyong said. “We don’t want our countries to slide into poverty.”<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
–Reuters–<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":40672,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[78,44],"class_list":["post-40671","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-featured","news-type-finance","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"An impending \"super\" El Ni\u00f1o is likely to inflict a combined $10 billion to $20 billion hit on affected African countries and trigger mass migration from hard-hit areas, the African Development Bank's (AfDB) top climate \u200bexpert told Reuters.\r\n","published_date":"","news_description":"An impending \"super\" El Ni\u00f1o is likely to inflict a combined $10 billion to $20 billion hit on affected African countries and trigger mass migration from hard-hit areas, the African Development Bank's (AfDB) top climate \u200bexpert told Reuters.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/40671","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/40671\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40673,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/40671\/revisions\/40673"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40672"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=40671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}