Economists are warning that a potentially historic "super" El Niño weather cycle developing this year could trigger a severe shock to global food prices lasting into 2028, compounding inflation already stoked by the ongoing war between the United States and Iran.

As the Iran conflict pushes world food prices to their highest level in three years, economists say global supply chains are facing what amounts to two simultaneous shocks: one driven by war-related disruption to shipping and fertilizer supplies, and another driven by extreme weather linked to a rapidly intensifying climate pattern in the Pacific Ocean.

Scientists say the developing 2026-27 El Niño, which forms when shifting wind patterns allow warmer water to spread across the central and eastern equatorial Pacific, has a historically unusual chance of becoming a "very strong" event capable of fueling heatwaves, flooding and more intense storm activity worldwide. The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration confirmed last month that warming conditions were taking hold in the Pacific, with NOAA placing a 96% probability on full El Niño conditions persisting through the Northern Hemisphere winter of 2026-27. Some forecasting models have projected sea surface temperature anomalies in the key Niño 3.4 monitoring region climbing beyond 4 degrees Celsius above average by November, a level that would place the event among the strongest ever recorded, alongside a small handful of comparable episodes since 1950, including 1972-73, 1982-83, 1997-98, 2015-16 and 2023-24.

Informally described as a "super" or "Godzilla" El Niño, the pattern is not an official meteorological classification but has been widely adopted this year by forecasters and analysts to describe the unusual strength of........

© International Business Times