The transition from the El Niño phenomenon, which is now in its final phase, to La Niña will be abrupt, which takes time away from species and populations to recover from one climatic event to the other, which is why the countries of Latin America They must be on alert, experts in the region said on Thursday.
Although the region is still recovering from the impact of the El Niño phenomenon, currently in retreat, it is already preparing for a La Niña phenomenon that could occur in the coming months with oscillations in rainfall and drought patterns and a strong hurricane season, they said. experts on a panel organized by the FAO regional office.
In the talk called “Preparing for La Niña, advances and challenges to measure its impact on agri-food systems”, the experts agreed that the transition periods between the two phenomena that occurred in other decades are no longer occurring and that reduces the times for affected communities to recover and prepare.
«We saw it in March, a year ago we came out of a Girl and in March we already had some signs of a Boy. Now we are again in March and April with signs of Niña (…) We have not been able to recover from the impact of the phenomenon (…) and we quickly went to the opposite,” said Yolanda González, director of the International Research Center for the El Niño Phenomenon (CIIFEN). ).
The specialist pointed out that with a warm planet and with anomalies in the temperature of both the ocean and the atmosphere, we are receiving the change to “neutrality and the preparation of La Niña with a very anomalous planet in temperatures.”
“This gives us all a wake-up call to be on significant and maximum alert in the face of these changes,” he noted.
El Niño is independent of climate change, but experts have observed changes in the way the phenomenon is occurring, such as, for example, an increase in rainfall, heat waves and periods of drought, according to the FAO technical team. .
Rapid transitions between El Niño and La Niña can also be correlated with climate change, although science does not yet allow causalities to be established unequivocally, they added.
El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) refers to variations in temperatures in the Pacific Ocean, which consists of two opposing patterns or episodes, El Niño (warm phase) and La Niña (cold phase) that last between nine and 12 months, and They occur every two to seven years, although they do not have a regular calendar.
The El Niño and La Niña patterns have consequences in different parts of the planet and in Latin America they have impacted the production of key crops such as wheat, rice, and corn, causing effects on the economy of countries, highly dependent on raw materials.
«If we had a longer period towards a normal transition period (…) we should have a relatively expected ecological response (…) but this abrupt change probably generates a greater stressor and from that point of view we have uncertainty about how the animals will respond. ecological systems,” said Jaime Letelier, head of Oceanography at the Fisheries Development Institute (IFOP) of the Government of Chile.
Also participating in the panel were Juan Tribín Rivera, FAO specialist in Colombia; María Vera Máximo, from Action Against Hunger; Deborah Daniels-Williams, from the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, Fisheries and Rural Transformation in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines; and Marion Khamis, FAO Risk Management and Resilience specialist for Latin America.
“The abrupt changes that species are having to face and the fact that these cycles are now almost overlapping ultimately reduces the resilience capacity to adapt to these changes, so we are facing a scenario that implies an enormous challenge,” said Khamis.
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