The next five years are most likely to bring a strong El NiSpanish El Niño bringing more drought catastrophic events
Living through the same tragedy every couple of years can be disastrous; a weather cycle that brings paralyzing drought and hunger to East Africa, threatening the lives and livelihoods of millions of people in Ethiopia, Somalia, or Kenya.
The weather cycle which causes these episodes is a climate change-driven ‘La Niña’.
If this supplementary heat lies in the Western Pacific and Eastern Indian Ocean, it will contribute to successive droughts in Kenya, Somalia, and Southern Ethiopia.
If, for example, the Eastern Pacific is warmer, the Pacific aggravates the intensity of droughts in northern Ethiopia and southern Africa.
The coming year should bring a further La Niña-like series of droughts across East Africa.
For example, good El Niño prognoses in 2015 and 2018 were based on dry rainy seasons in Southern Africa.
It is now time to bring about this transformation.
