A new El Niño phase is likely to begin within weeks, putting agriculture on alert around the world. New analyses by experts at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) allow for detailed mapping of where El Nino-linked drought is most likely to impact crops and pasturelands.
As the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) forecasts a stronger-than-usual cycle, FAO's analysis draws on 41 years of historical satellite imagery from its Agricultural Stress Index System (ASIS), tracing where strong and very strong El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) events tend to cause the most severe drought.
The risks are sharpest in the Sahel, across Southern Africa, in South and Southeast Asia, and in Central America's Dry Corridor and the Caribbean, where some agricultural and pastureland areas face more than a 50 percent chance of drought over the coming months.
Many of the same regions were hit hard during the El Niño events of 2015-16 and 2023-24. El Niño cycles expose the same vulnerabilities and tend to trigger failed harvests, livestock losses, rising household debt, and migration in search of food and water. In 2015-16 alone, El Niño affected more than 60 million people and prompted $5 billion in humanitarian appeals across 23 countries.
Risks are now skewed to the upside as climate extremes increasingly collide with conflict and economic stress. "This isn't like previous El Niños. The planet is much warmer today, and with conflict and food insecurity widespread, this new phase will hit hardest in places that are already vulnerable and have limited coping capacity," said Jorge Alvar-Beltrán, FAO Natural Resources Officer.
The map highlights priority targets for early action before forecasts become losses. In response to the growing threat, FAO and the World Food Programme (WFP) have launched a joint anticipatory action appeal seeking $202 million to protect 8.8 million people across 22 high-risk countries from the potential impact of a strong El Niño weather pattern. The appeal aims to scale up early interventions including support to farmers and pastoralists, anticipatory cash assistance, and strengthened early warning systems before droughts, floods and storms escalate into humanitarian emergencies.
Where exposure is highest
Risk is rarely about rainfall deficits alone. A moderate drought can be devastating in places already facing conflict and chronic hunger, where crops depend entirely on rainfall, livestock holds much of a household's wealth, and families have little margin for recovery. More than 80 percent of drought impacts on agriculture are projected to hit in low- and middle-income countries."A farmer might first lose crops, then livestock, and with that their entire livelihood," said Alvar-Beltrán. "With cascading impacts of multiple crises already evident, there is an urgent need to act early."
Across the Sahel, food insecurity has deepened for five consecutive years, while conflict continues to displace people and limit access to vulnerable communities. The maps point to a broad belt of agricultural drought stretching from Senegal and southern Mauritania through Côte d'Ivoire, Ghana, Togo, Benin and Nigeria, and eastward into Ethiopia and Sudan.
In Southern Africa, the signal is more pronounced. The most recent El Niño cycle brought the region's worst drought in more than a century, leaving 61 million people in need of assistance, straining livestock, water systems and pasturelands, and pushing more than 8 million people into food insecurity. FAO's forecast points to a greater than 50 percent probability of agricultural drought across large parts of Namibia and Botswana, extending into Angola, Zambia, Zimbabwe, South Africa and parts of Mozambique and Madagascar. In a region where livestock underpins both food security and household wealth, the loss of pasture quickly becomes a loss of assets and wealth.
In Central America and the Caribbean, drought risks can quickly translate into hunger. The 2015-16 El Niño left 3.5 million people food insecure across Central America's Dry Corridor, while in Haiti harvests collapsed by up to 70 percent, doubling food insecurity in a matter of months. Current forecasts point to a 70 percent probability of below-normal rainfall across the region. The risk of agricultural drought is highest along the Dry Corridor, Colombia and Venezuela and in Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Haiti.
In Asia, the risk extends to critical global markets. El Niño can weaken the summer monsoon across much of India, putting rainfed crops such as rice and maize under stress during the critical growing season. In 2015, maize and rice output fell in major producing countries, pushing up prices for key food commodity crops. This time, agricultural drought risk runs from Pakistan and India through to Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia and Viet Nam and further to the East including the Philippines, Indonesia and Timor-Leste.
Some of the countries identified as highly exposed to El Niño-linked shocks also feature prominently in FAO and WFP's latest Hunger Hotspots analysis, underscoring how climate shocks increasingly interact with conflict and economic stress further exacerbating acute food insecurity.
A map for action
When risk is identified early and at the local level, farmers and pastoralists can make critical planting and livestock-management decisions before the growing season is fully underway: delaying planting, choosing drought-tolerant crops, storing fodder for cattle and securing extra water reserves before shortages begin.
FAO's analysis can narrow the risk assessment in some areas to a single square kilometer. But turning precision into protection means linking national meteorological and hydrological services, agriculture ministries and extension networks, so the warning reaches the farmer in time.
"This level of detail changes what a government can do," said FAO Natural Resources Officer Riccardo Soldan. "Instead of spreading resources thinly, it can concentrate support in the hotspots, directing cash transfers, water and irrigation support, livestock feed, and other critical inputs to the places most at risk."
There is already evidence that acting before losses take hold can work. In Southern Africa, ahead of the 2023-24 El Niño, a regional pre-season effort directed nearly $31 million to more than two million people across seven countries, providing seeds, livestock support, and better forecasting through early warning systems. In Central America, timely distribution of drought-tolerant and short-growing-cycle seeds helped families produce vegetables, improving household food supplies and reducing the likelihood of families resorting to negative coping mechanisms, such as selling assets or skipping meals.
FAO's analysis can help governments and partners decide where to move first, what support is most urgent, and which communities are least equipped to handle another failed season.
El Niño is forming, and the maps are clear. What happens next depends on how quickly decisions follow.
