Keypoints:
- Losses could reach $20bn
- Food and power systems face disruption
- Adaptation needs could reach $100bn
AFRICA could lose between $10bn and $20bn if a rapidly strengthening El Niño brings severe drought, flooding and storms to its most exposed economies, according to Anthony Nyong, the African Development Bank’s director for climate change and green growth.
The estimate points to a significant threat to growth, food security and public finances. However, it was given during an interview with Reuters. No separate AfDB assessment carrying the figure was located in the material reviewed, meaning it should be treated as an interview-based estimate rather than a published, country-by-country AfDB assessment.
Loss estimate rests on interview
Nyong told Reuters that El Niño could reduce GDP in heavily affected countries by an average of one to two percent, producing combined losses of $10bn to $20bn. He provided no country-level breakdown and warned that repeated climate shocks could push vulnerable economies further into poverty.
He said agricultural losses could reach about $327m, fisheries productivity could fall by between one and four percent, and maize prices could double in the most severely affected markets. Sudan, South Sudan, the DRC, Somalia, Mali, Burundi and Nigeria were identified as particularly vulnerable to displacement and competition over scarce land and water.
Strong event increasingly likely
NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center said on July 9, 2026, that El Niño was strengthening, with a 97 percent chance that it would persist into early 2027. It placed the probability of a very strong event during October–December 2026 at 81 percent.
The World Meteorological Organisation has also forecast rapid intensification. The WMO classifies El Niño events as weak, moderate, strong or very strong. It does not use ‘super El Niño’ because the term is not part of its operational classification system.
Food and power risks mount
Africa’s recent experience shows how quickly weather disruption can spread through economies. The 2023–24 El Niño brought severe drought to Southern Africa and heavy rain and flooding to parts of East Africa, damaging crops, infrastructure and electricity generation.
Africa Briefing reported that Zambia received a $208m World Bank grant following prolonged drought that caused severe social and economic damage. Falling reservoir levels also forced the country to restrict electricity supplies, exposing its dependence on hydropower.
West African export economies face a different risk. Heavy rainfall in Cote d’Ivoire has raised concerns about flooding and disease in cocoa-growing areas, illustrating how excessive rain as well as drought can reduce farm incomes and unsettle global supply chains.
Climate finance gap widens
The AfDB’s African Economic Outlook 2026 projects continental growth of 4.2 percent this year and 4.4 percent in 2027. A severe El Niño would add a new downside risk for governments already facing expensive debt, restricted fiscal space and high borrowing costs.
Nyong told Reuters that Africa could require as much as $100bn in adaptation finance over the next 12 months, up from an earlier need of about $50bn. That figure is also interview-based rather than drawn from a published AfDB financing study.
UNEP’s Adaptation Gap Report 2025 independently estimates that developing countries will need between $310bn and $365bn annually for adaptation by 2035. International public adaptation finance reached only $26bn in 2023.
Governments face narrow window
African governments now face pressure to strengthen early-warning systems, protect food reserves, climate-proof infrastructure and arrange emergency finance before the event reaches its expected peak. The eventual cost will depend not only on El Niño’s strength, but also on how quickly governments and development lenders prepare.
