El Niño: What's Changed and What Hasn't

Back in our irrigation strategy post, we mentioned a strengthening El Niño and dam levels already trailing the year before. A few weeks later, it's worth an update, because the picture has shifted, and not in the direction most growers would hope.

The South African Weather Service now says this El Niño is on track to become one of the strongest on record, with international forecasters putting real odds on it exceeding every event measured since 1950. That's a meaningfully stronger statement than the "moderate, strengthening" language in circulation when we last wrote about this. At the same time, there's a more reassuring number sitting underneath the headlines that's worth putting in front of the alarming one — so this post is deliberately both: what's got more serious, and what hasn't.

What's changed: this is now a very strong event

SAWS has moved from "El Niño likely" to warning of a very strong event, with international models giving it a real chance of becoming the strongest since global records began in 1950. The seasonal outlook for October to December still points to below-normal rainfall as the most likely outcome across most of the country, alongside above-normal temperatures — and forecasters are now flagging that the combination of this event and background global warming could make next year the warmest on record.

For growers, the practical takeaway hasn't changed in kind, only in urgency: the root-health, pest-scouting and water-efficiency groundwork covered in our last three posts matters more now than it did in August, not less. If you haven't started on any of it, this is the point to start.

What hasn't changed: the buffer is real, and history isn't uniformly grim

Two things are worth holding onto alongside the warning. First, national average dam storage stood at 95.5% as of August — a strong starting position, even though the regional picture is uneven (the Western Cape numbers we cited last time are still worth watching on their own). A full dam network doesn't cancel out a dry summer, but it does mean South Africa is going into this event from a position of strength rather than already depleted, which matters for how long any shortfall takes to bite.

Second, a very strong El Niño doesn't automatically mean drought everywhere. The 1997/98 event — one of the strongest on record — still produced slightly above-normal rainfall over parts of South Africa's summer rainfall region. Below-normal rainfall remains the statistically likely outcome this summer, and that's the sensible planning assumption, but "likely" isn't "certain," and it's worth resisting the urge to treat this as a foregone dry season.

What this means heading into the Nov–Jan window

The critical establishment period we raised last time — November through January, when rainfall suppression is expected to be most pronounced — hasn't moved. What's changed is how much margin for error is left in that window, given the intensity now being forecast. A few adjustments worth making on top of the irrigation groundwork already covered:

• Watch heat as its own risk, not just dryness. A very strong El Niño paired with background warming means the temperature side of this forecast deserves equal attention to the rainfall side. Where sunburn or heat stress on fruit and exposed crops has been a marginal concern in past seasons, this is the season to take it seriously — a reflective particle film (such as EcoSun) is worth considering for high-exposure crops in high-UV areas.
• Track your own dam or borehole level against the national average, not instead of it. A 95.5% national figure is reassuring, but it's an average — it says nothing about your specific water source. If you haven't tested pumps and boreholes yet per our last post's checklist, the intensified forecast is the reason to move that up the list.
• Keep the root-health and soil-conditioning programme in place. Everything in our first post about deeper, more efficient root systems and better soil water-holding capacity becomes more valuable, not less, the drier and hotter the season actually turns out to be.

The bottom line

This isn't a reason to panic, and it isn't a reason to relax either. The forecast has  intensified over the past six weeks, and the sensible response is the one we've been building toward all season: root health in place, pest scouting underway, water infrastructure checked, and now heat exposure added to the list. We'll check back in again once we're through the start of the Nov–Jan window and have real numbers instead of forecasts to work with.

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Sources consulted: South African Weather Service seasonal outlook, via SAnews, "SAWS warns of very strong El Niño and hotter, drier spring conditions"; Mail & Guardian, "El Niño set to strengthen into very strong event, WMO says" (4 September 2026); Daily Maverick, "Very strong El Niño is a stress test for SA's food systems" (20 September 2026); Sunday Times, "El Niño looms but South Africa's farmers are better prepared for drought" (15 September 2026).