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‘Super El Nino’ threatens India’s monsoon rains, critical crops
- The climate pattern El Nino heralds hotter, drier conditions, which could turn a not-so-great rainy season into a bad one for India
- Nearly 60 per cent of the country’s 1.4 billion people directly or indirectly depend on agriculture for their source of income
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As if scorching temperatures predicted for India’s summer months were not enough, El Nino is now threatening to play spoiler to the monsoon rains that typically bring an end to the excruciating dry heat and irrigate parched crops.
“La Nina conditions are changing rapidly to El Nino and by the time the monsoon arrives around June, El Nino should be making its presence felt,” said GP Sharma, president of privately owned Skymet Weather Services. “And this El Nino could be one of the strongest yet – some people are calling it a super-El Nino event.”
El Nino and La Nina are two opposing climate patterns over the Pacific Ocean. La Nina generally brings cooler, wetter weather, while El Nino heralds hotter, drier conditions. Climate models globally show a “high chance” of El Nino returning in June and replacing La Nina.
El Nino corrupts the monsoon rainfall, sometimes very seriously
Both Skymet and the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) already expect the monsoon to deliver a relatively modest amount of rainfall during its June-to-September journey across India.
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