This article was originally published by Michael Snyder at The Economic Collapse Blog.
A very intense El Niño has formed in the equatorial waters of the Pacific Ocean much earlier than originally anticipated, and we are being warned that it could cause trillions of dollars of damage to the global economy. Considering everything else that is going on in our world right now, that is really bad news.
It is being projected that the El Niño that has developed in the southern Pacific is likely to rapidly transform into a “Super El Niño” of frightening strength. At the same time, a “9,000-mile marine heatwave” has developed in the northern Pacific. Many believe that these two marine heatwaves will combine to form a “Godzilla El Niño” which will be unlike anything we have ever experienced before.
Last week, we received official confirmation that an El Niño “has officially formed in the Pacific Ocean”…
A powerful El Nino has officially formed in the Pacific Ocean, with meteorologists warning Thursday that it is poised to reach historic strength and intensify extreme weather events across the globe.
The natural warming cycle is expected to exacerbate global temperatures, already elevated by fossil fuel emissions, and could supercharge severe weather patterns worldwide. The phenomenon is predicted to rival or even surpass the record-setting El Nino of 1997, which caused billions in damages through heatwaves, floods, droughts, tornadoes, and wildfires.
The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration formally confirmed the existence of the El Nino, a warming of the Pacific near the equator that profoundly affects global weather patterns.
This wasn’t supposed to happen yet.
Normally, El Niños start once the summer is over, but this one “is developing much earlier and faster than expected”…
“Most El Niños begin in the fall, so this is developing much earlier and faster than expected,” AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Chad Merrill said. “The weather patterns here early in the summer are also lining up to what is expected with an El Niño.”
Needless to say, this isn’t a good sign.
It appears that this El Niño is going to be a whopper, and that should deeply trouble all of us because a couple of other very strong El Niños in the past literally cost the global economy trillions of dollars…
For example, the 1982-83 El Niño led to $4.1 trillion in global income losses, while the 1997-98 El Niño cost about $5.7 trillion, a 2023 study suggested.
“The current forecasts imply this could be the costliest El Niño on record,” said Justin Mankin, a Dartmouth geography associate professor who studies El Niño’s economic impacts.
If the El Niño that just formed becomes the strongest of all time, it could potentially cause more than 10 trillion dollars of damage to the global economy.
In the months ahead, global food production could drop precipitously, supply chains could be severely disrupted, and we could witness an endless series of extremely destructive weather disasters…
El Niño tends to slow down global economic growth and cause trillions in losses, primarily due to the fact that it triggers disruptive weather patterns that impact agriculture, infrastructure, and supply chains.
In the years it forms, El Niño triggers wide-ranging changes in weather and climate patterns that result in a potpourri of global disasters, including devastating floods, crop-killing droughts, plummeting fish populations and an uptick in tropical diseases worldwide, experts say.
The strongest El Niño on record was the “Super El Niño” of 1877 and 1878.
That “Super El Niño” was one of the primary reasons why approximately 50 million people starved to death during the Great Famine of 1876 to 1878…
Climate officials added that this El Nino will likely be one of the strongest since 1950, and there is a fear it could match an event from 1877, which triggered severe droughts and crop failures around the world, contributing to more than 50 million deaths globally.
Many climate historians think the 1877 event reshaped world history, and some consider it one of the first ‘truly global climate disasters.’
In 2026, farmers all over the world are already dealing with seemingly endless drought, much higher diesel prices and an unprecedented fertilizer crisis.
Now we are being told that the El Niño that has just formed “could have a multiplier effect on wheat, rice, and corn, which are already at risk due to reduced fertilizer availability”…
“A Super El Niño, combined with the current Middle East conflict and resulting fertilizer shortages, could have a multiplier effect on wheat, rice, and corn, which are already at risk due to reduced fertilizer availability during the planting season,” said Saskia van Gendt, chief sustainability officer with Blue Yonder, a supply chain management company, in an e-mail to USA TODAY. “This will result in near-term shortages and price increases, along with a prolonged impact, since these crops are used as animal feed and in processed foods.”
Yes, there will be shortages and price increases.
The experts keep telling us this, but it just isn’t sinking in for the general population yet.
Some of the tropical areas of the globe that we import a lot of key commodities from will be hit particularly hard by this El Niño…
David Warrick, senior vice president of strategy at Overhaul, a supply chain risk management company, and former head of Microsoft’s Global Supply Chain, told Newsweek that of the imported products that could be impacted, “rice is the most immediate concern,” pointing to Thailand, Vietnam and India as key exporters that are all vulnerable to drought conditions caused by an El Niño.
“After rice, I’d flag coffee, cocoa, palm oil, and sugar—all tropical commodities highly sensitive to El Niño-driven heat and drought,” he added. “For American consumers, that translates to pressure on everyday grocery staples like cooking oils, chocolate, packaged foods, coffee.”
Warrick warned that when major exporters are hit at the same time, “import-dependent countries scramble, and prices spike fast.”
For years, I have been warning that global food supplies were getting tighter and that shortages would be coming.
Now we are here.
In wealthy countries such as the United States, high food prices will go even higher.
In poor countries all over the planet, many of those who are currently hungry will soon be starving, and many of those who are currently starving will soon die.
The number of people in the world who were experiencing acute hunger was already at a record high before the war with Iran even started.
The war took our troubles to a new level, and now a “Godzilla El Niño” threatens to change everything.
Michael’s new book, entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next,” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.
About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book, entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next,” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com. He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com, including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. When you purchase any of Michael’s books, you help to support the work that he is doing. You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter. Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream, and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites. These are such troubled times, and people need hope. John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.
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