Super El Niño threatens global food price surge to 2028

Economists and climate scientists are warning that a strengthening El Niño weather phenomenon, colliding with existing geopolitical and economic pressures, threatens to deliver a severe and prolonged shock to global food supplies and consumer prices that could last into 2028. The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration confirmed last month that warming conditions were taking hold in the Pacific, and recent data from the National Weather Service indicates the pattern is gaining strength, with an 81 percent chance it will develop into a "Super El Niño" event lasting into early 2027.

This climate event is converging with the ongoing conflict in Iran, which has already pushed world food prices to a three-year high, creating what analysts describe as a "double shock" to fragile global supply chains. Financial institutions including Goldman Sachs and UniCredit warn the economic aftershocks could take until the second half of 2028 to be fully realized due to what they term a "lag effect." Crop production relies on staggered seasonal cycles, meaning extreme weather disrupting planting and growth now will take many months to translate into scarcity on supermarket shelves.