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Latin America and the Caribbean are well acquainted with sudden changes in temperature.
They also have experience living through El Niño and La Niña phenomena, a climatic pattern characterized by warm seasons, in the first case, and cooling, in the second, which have taken their toll on this part of the continent.
According to Raúl Salazar, head of the Regional Office for the Americas and the Caribbean of the United Nations for Disaster Risk Reduction, "the region has assumed 43% of the global economic losses" related to these changes.
In fact, the year that just passed, 2022, was marked by a strong La Niña phenomenon in several countries.
In Colombia, explains Diana Giraldo Méndez, a researcher with the Alianza Bioversity (CIAT) climate action team, rainfall in some cases was 60% higher than average, which led the government to declare a state of emergency.
While "in countries such as southern Brazil, Argentina and Chile, the conditions of intense drought due to the La Niña phenomenon have affected crops, drying up rivers and impacting hydroelectric generation."
But this phenomenon has not ended.
As Franklyn Ruiz, part of the Colombian Institute of Hydrology, Meteorology and Environmental Studies (Ideam), reports, the weather forecasts point to it ending only until the end of the first semester, so the rains will continue in that country.
But it is also one of the cold seasons that has lasted the longest.
“La Niña, which began in September 2020, has not gone away.
In Central America and the Caribbean, rainfall will continue to be above average,” Giraldo says.
"Although it has something exceptional and, if the predictions are confirmed, it would be the first phenomenon in this century that lasts three years," adds the expert.
These are some keys to what could happen at the climate level in the region during 2023 and how some countries are preparing.
What is known about El Nino
After the end of La Niña and especially towards the west of South America, there is an 82% probability that there will be a stable period between the months of March, April and May, explains Ruiz, from Ideam.
That is, those would be months neither of much rain nor of drought.
But, further on, he comments, "there is a better chance that I know of a warm event", since, for August, September and October, so far there is a 66% probability of experiencing an El Niño phenomenon.
However, as Dr. Ken Takahashi, a scientific researcher at the Geophysical Institute of Peru, comments, at this time of the year, the predictions still have a lot of uncertainty, so "countries should wait until the May forecasts to have a better idea if we address a Child”.
Why do experts insist on prevention?
If there is something that all the experts agree on, it is that prevention and early attention mechanisms are key to avoiding greater evils.
In the words of Salazar, "guaranteeing a safe world for the climate future is the greatest public good that governments can offer."
Takahashi adds: “It is important that countries have a culture of prevention and that they reduce the vulnerability of their citizens.
The predictions of El Niño and La Niña can serve to complement and reinforce these measures”.
Among the main recommendations, three stand out.
The first is related to improving the adaptation and risk management metrics responsible for measuring the climate emergency.
“Better management minimizes adverse effects and creates opportunities to transform systems and societies,” explains Salazar.
Heavy rain falls on the houses of an indigenous community next to the Purus river in Ucayali (Peru). ERNESTO BENAVIDES
The second measure that must be reinforced is the empowerment of communities, since rural and remote areas are the ones that are most often affected.
“Communities must have easy access to information about climate risks, associated impacts, and the cost of inaction, to better appreciate the effects of their actions,” he says.
In addition, Salazar points out that it is important to invest in sustainable and resilient infrastructure systems.
Giraldo, from CIAT and a PhD candidate from the University of Reading, in the United Kingdom, also advocates that farmers make their own decisions based on climate information and their demands "regardless of their level of literacy."
“That is why we have been working on the Integrated Participatory Climate Services for Agriculture (PICSA).
Also,
The importance of this approach is such that the VIII Regional Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction in the Americas and the Caribbean will be held on February 28, in Punta del Este, Uruguay, to broaden the conversation about science and technology. applied to disasters.
“It is a fundamental piece in the construction of more resilient, secure societies and with a much more prosperous and equitable future,” says Salazar.
Is the region preparing?
The experience and presence of these phenomena has been improving the management of the region.
In Latin America, significant investments have been made to strengthen specialized institutions and other early warning systems have been created and other protocols that were created in the 1980s have been improved.
However, each country has taken its own initiatives.
Grinia Jesús Roldán, deputy director of climate prediction at the National Meteorology and Hydrology Service of Peru (Senamhi) explains that different action plans have been drawn up in the country and that there are already public policies for risk management.
"What needs to be improved is the transfer of these to local plans, because the national mechanisms already exist."
Giraldo is optimistic about the action plan for the next five years in the region, announced by the Secretary General of the United Nations at COP 27 to guarantee that every person is protected by early warning systems within five years.
This effort will be led by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).
With an initial investment of 3.100 million dollars.
“This strategy has four work pillars that allow us to anticipate events such as storms, heat waves, floods, and droughts,” explains Giraldo, who will participate in its implementation on January 30 in Jamaica.
A woman cools off during a heat wave in Buenos Aires (Argentina), on January 17, 2023. Enrique Garcia Medina (EFE)
On the other hand, Agroclimatic Technical Roundtables (MTA) have been created in 11 countries in the region (Honduras, Colombia, Guatemala, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Panama, Paraguay, Mexico, Ecuador, Peru and Chile).
These spaces for dialogue allow the integration of multiple actors (farmers, scientists, academia, and representatives of the public and private sectors) to improve decision-making.
Currently, there is a network of 64 MTAs, 420 stakeholders actively participating and 500,000 farmers accessing this information.
"They are part of the regional strategy for disaster risk management in the agricultural sector and food and nutrition security," the expert explains by email.
Is Climate Change What's Behind El Niño and La Niña?
One of the things that Franklin, from Ideam, clarifies is that in countries like Colombia, the annual weather is still more determined by climatic and interannual variability, associated with El Niño and La Niña events, than by global climate change.
For example, while international meteorological organizations have classified 2022 as one of the five warmest years on record, in Colombia it was a normal year, with no major anomalies in terms of temperature.
And it is that the temperature that we feel is given by a mixture of factors that vary at a more local level.
As for the relationship between climate change and this type of phenomenon, the truth is that science has not yet reached a consensus.
Despite the fact that reports such as those of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) indicate that events such as El Niño have been greater in strength, magnitude and frequency since 1950, it is not known if this is related to climate change caused by human activities.
What this panel of experts does warn in its latest report is that the variability of rainfall related to El Niño and La Niña can be amplified after 2050 in scenarios where greenhouse gas emissions are not drastically reduced.