Published : 07 Aug 2026, 05:47 AM
Updated : 08 Sep 2026, 09:30 AM
The World Food Programme warned that a powerful El Niño weather event could push nearly an additional 49 million people into acute food insecurity across some of the world's most vulnerable regions by the end of next year.
Meanwhile, Britain's cereal harvest is on track to be the worst since comparable records began in 1984, as crops wither after one of the driest and hottest spring-summer periods on record.
But it’s not just climate pressures affecting food supplies.
A surge in attacks on ships, ports and export terminals in the Black Sea is disrupting global supplies of grain and oil, showing how conflict and weather are combining to threaten food security.
Acute Food Insecurity
The World Food Programme said in a report that there was an 81 percent chance of a very strong El Niño event, with sea surface temperatures at their warmest levels since at least 1982 and potentially making it the strongest such event since 1950.
For context, El Niño is a periodic warming of ocean surface temperatures in the Pacific, which alters global weather patterns and is often associated with drought in Southern Africa, delayed monsoons in parts of Asia and erratic rainfall elsewhere.
Central America and Southern Africa are expected to be among the hardest-hit regions, with the number of people facing food insecurity set to increase by 83 percent in Central America and nearly 75 percent in Southern Africa, the WFP report said. Southern Africa as well as South America and the Caribbean could each see more than 12 million additional people fall into acute food insecurity.
In Europe, Britain’s Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit said the dry conditions may have knocked as much as 2.5 million metric tons off the nation’s cereal and oilseed harvest compared to earlier forecasts, costing UK arable farmers up to £390 million ($524 million) in lost revenue.
Farmers across Europe have also warned of a slump in production and rising prices due to the extreme weather.
When Shocks Begin To Overlap
The concern for policymakers is the prospect of several overlapping shocks.
Jean-Martin Bauer, director of WFP's Food Security and Nutrition Analysis Service, told reporters that global food markets entered the El Niño period in a relatively strong position following good harvests in 2025, but warned that conflict in West Asia and potential weather-related crop losses could put further upward pressure on prices.
Russia, the world's largest wheat exporter, and Ukraine, also a major agricultural exporter, have intensified attacks on each other's agricultural export facilities and commercial vessels in the Black Sea area in recent weeks.
The Black Sea is a vital route for shipments of grain, crude oil and refined products. Its waters are shared by Russia and Ukraine as well as Bulgaria, Georgia, Romania and Turkey.
The latest escalation is creating another pressure point for commodity markets already coping with disruptions to major shipping routes in West Asia.
"The bigger concern is when shocks begin to overlap,” said Nicolas Jaquier, emerging market fixed income portfolio manager at global investment manager Ninety One.
“If higher energy prices coincide with fertiliser constraints and then weather-related food inflation, the impact becomes broader and more persistent than any one shock on its own,” he added.
In Conversation
Dan Lambe, chief executive of the US-based nonprofit Arbor Day Foundation, shares his thoughts on wildfires and forest regeneration:
“Increasing global temperatures have created drier conditions that cause wildfires to burn hotter and longer, making natural forest regeneration less likely.
“It’s made reforestation efforts – from site preparation and seedling procurement to tree planting and growth management – even more critical.
“A warmer world is changing landscapes and to ensure forests are future-resilient, we need to leverage science and data to understand what those changes might look like and what tree species will thrive in those conditions.
“But reforestation doesn’t happen on a stopwatch.
“After disasters like the wildfires in Spain and Spokane, people come first. Our job is to listen to communities, work with local partners, and be ready to help replant when the time is right, whether that’s next season or years from now.”
