The images have been widely relayed: torrential rains in the middle of the desert region, in the United Arab Emirates, Oman, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. A real deluge which caused at least 24 victims and caused much damage. However, this is only one of the extreme climatic events recorded in recent weeks around the world. We could also list the deadly floods in Kenya, the historic heatwave in Southeast Asia, the heat wave and torrential rains in Brazil, the drought in southern Africa or the water crisis in Ecuador and Colombia… The common point in these disasters? They have all been attributed to global warming, amplified by El Niño, a complex natural phenomenon lasting eight to twelve months and reappearing every three to seven years in the Pacific.
If its current phase should soon end, its consequences are set to last, as “climate insecurity often translates – and quickly – into the form of geopolitical and strategic insecurity”, analyzes Jean-Michel Valantin, doctor and researcher in strategic studies at the think tank The Red Team Analysis Societyand co-author with journalist Laurent Testot of El Niño, History and geopolitics of a climate bomb (Nouveau monde éditions, 2023).
L’Express: Have we, in your opinion, underestimated the intensity of this El Niño phenomenon, whose effects add to those of climate change?
Jean-Michel Valantin: In its 2023-2024 version, El Niño was quickly identified as potentially being a strong cycle. One year after this diagnosis, we are seeing very violent effects on the areas normally affected, namely the tropical world. However, I would rather say that this phenomenon combines with climate change, and not superimposes itself. This creates an additional dimension of the problem. Because as predicted last year by meteorological centers, El Niño very suddenly pushed us beyond +1.5°C (since the pre-industrial era), which was the limit of the defined danger zone. by climatologists for around ten years.
Are there immediate geopolitical consequences?
We must understand that climate change does not yet generate geopolitical consequences in itself. But for how long… ? On the other hand, it induces an increasingly strong general tension, which combines with existing geopolitical tensions. In my opinion, there really is a tipping point in 2022 with the Russian offensive in Ukraine. Very quickly, the war had the effect of considerably hampering the export of Ukrainian and Russian cereals on international markets, while the two countries combined represent approximately 30% of sales at the international level.
We therefore observed a strain on the agri-food markets when, at the same time, the year 2022 was marked by a whole series of extreme climatic events, such as super heat waves in South and South-East Asia, The worsening of the megadrought in North America, climatic tensions in Latin America and Africa… Above all, they have affected large agricultural production areas. India, which is the second largest producer of wheat in the world, for example saw its harvest drop by almost 20%, and therefore stopped exporting for several months.
Precisely, in 2022, it was still a cycle of La Niña, the opposite counterpart of El Niño, which tends to cool the planet…
Effectively. In 2023, a year of transition, a very similar scenario is playing out again, with the war in Ukraine continuing, and still these difficulties in exporting Ukrainian cereals to international markets. But, on the Russian side, a geopolitical shift is taking place: enormous agricultural and trade agreements are signed with China, which is beginning to import phenomenal quantities of Russian cereals. At the same time, extreme weather events are increasing. We are now in 2024, the time of peak El Niño effects, with air and sea heat waves. Geopolitical tensions have increased around the world. If the trend continues, we therefore arrive at a third year of resurgence of extreme climatic phenomena in major agricultural production areas, which risks combining with the increasing intensity of ever more violent geopolitical crises.
In your book published last October, you write that “El Niño 2023-2024 could be a ‘crash test’” for our societies. Really ?
Quite. This excellent concept is from Laurent Testot. Take the agricultural crisis that has been manifesting itself since this winter in Europe. It is very complex and results from the combination of several factors. However, two triggering effects can be highlighted. On the one hand, the heat waves and drought between spring and autumn 2022, which have a very harsh impact on agricultural systems. On the other hand, tensions developed due to the European Union’s decision to facilitate imports of Ukrainian cereals, in order to support kyiv’s economy.
These imports were quickly contested by a certain number of agricultural nations, such as Poland and Hungary, fearing that they would lower the prices of their own production. At the same time, a country like Spain has been very badly affected by drought: almost 80% of crops affected in 2023. So Spain, a major producer of fruits and vegetables, finds itself importing agricultural products, and then opposes the blocking of Ukrainian imports because the country needs them. These systems under stress, because of the war in Ukraine or extreme climatic events, are added to the other conflicts which cross this sector in each Member State. Everything converges. The agricultural crisis is still ongoing, aggravated by this nexus of climatic and geopolitical tensions. This is one form of the crash test.
But there are others. For example, in 2023, the Brazilian president’s first trip took place in China. Lula and Xi Jinping signed important trade agreements, particularly agricultural ones, because since 2018, China has replaced a good part of imports of American agricultural products with Brazilian imports. Brazil is truly becoming a strategic partner of Beijing in terms of food security. However, the combination of El Niño and climate change is producing extremely violent effects on the country, affected by an enormous drought, with the Amazon burning like never before. So, what about Brazilian agricultural yields? Knowing that behind this, some of the issues of Chinese food security are at stake? We can clearly see that with “this little excursion” beyond +1.5°C, enormous tensions can emerge very quickly. This El Niño moment highlights that our system, based on globalized exchanges between large production and consumption zones, remains very vulnerable.
In your book, you also take up a study dating from 2011. According to it, El Niño events are essential factors in the outbreak of 21% of wars in the world between 1950 and 2004. The figure is impressive.
Absolutely. I will give you a recent, particularly impressive example: the conflict in the Red Sea triggered by the Houthis, a militia drawn from a Yemeni population. This situation, which deters many ships from passing through the Red Sea, a priori has nothing to do with climate change or El Niño.
But we must keep in mind that this is one of the main arteries of globalization, and that the Red Sea leads to the Gulf of Aden, therefore to the Horn of Africa. However, this entire area has been ravaged again since last year by climate change and the effects of El Niño. Countries like Somalia and Kenya are under very high tension, with ongoing humanitarian disasters. And the fishing communities on the Somali coast are also those who produce pirates. Since last fall, we have seen an extremely strong resurgence of activity in Somali piracy, quite simply because living conditions have deteriorated incredibly due to the drought.
Isolated cargo ships passing through the Gulf of Aden and the Red Sea must therefore face a double risk, induced by the Houthis but also by Somali pirates. We see to what extent climatic and strategic situations are intertwined at full speed.
Can we already anticipate new conflicts at the end of this El Niño cycle?
The coming months are going to be very complicated in terms of weather. And it’s hard to say what will happen with the arrival of a La Niña cycle in such a complex landscape. Because first of all there is the shock on populations and infrastructures at the moment T, then the effects over time. The example of insurance systems is eloquent. Let’s take the example of California: this American state has so far managed to retain insurers at the last minute. This really shows how important the tension is. The scenario is very similar in Florida. Climate disasters generate consequences that intersect in all directions.
Nearly half of the world’s population will vote in 2024. Could the effects of climate change, boosted by El Niño, have a direct or indirect impact on certain elections?
This is a fascinating question with many implications, but I don’t have the answer. This is going to be very interesting to watch. Take the American election: it is already under stress due to climate change and the migration crisis. There are an average of 20,000 entries per day across the southern border of the United States – which is gigantic. The majority of these people are fleeing Central America, a region affected by absolutely staggering problems of social inequality, worsened by climate change. This area is caught in a socio-climatic nexus so violent that people are fleeing by the hundreds of thousands. This creates enormous tensions in the border states, while the American political context is completely polarized. I don’t even know if we can still talk about a debate because positions have hardened so much.
So we can say that climate change is already making its way into the American presidential campaign. Furthermore, the Republican Party remains openly climate sceptical. It is a political line, an important marker. Except that El Niño, which terribly reinforces climate change, is starting to result in a hurricane season which risks being very harsh. We can only speak in the conditional, but what if, between now and November, the United States were to experience waves of extreme weather events? Last week there was already a series of tornadoes like we’ve never seen before. How could this interfere with the presidential campaign? Very difficult to say. Will the risk of an increase in climate shocks make the Republicans’ climate skeptic posture more difficult? In 2016, Donald Trump was very active in this field, even if he is less active today.
What potential impact on the European election campaign?
Here too, the equation is complex. As in the United States, the migration issue occupies a central place in the debates preparing for the elections. But we must understand that it is also inseparable from a complex climatic and geopolitical whole. Migration pressure from Africa and the Middle East is increasing for economic reasons – people are moving to try to find better living conditions – and because of increasing climatic pressure on the Sahel. It’s the same thing in the Middle East where regions are becoming unlivable. All these tensions serve as a driving force for the displacement of populations.
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