{"id":866427,"date":"2026-07-15T16:53:42","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T14:53:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=866427"},"modified":"2026-07-15T16:53:45","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T14:53:45","slug":"important-information-about-severe-weather-coming-to-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business-opinion\/866427\/important-information-about-severe-weather-coming-to-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"Important information about severe weather coming to South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

South Africa could face another period of severe weather over the coming months as forecasts point to one of the strongest El Ni\u00f1o events in decades.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, the impact of drought on food price inflation has declined as real incomes have increased and the availability of new goods and services has grown.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the feedback from Investec chief economist Annabel Bishop, who stressed that while El Ni\u00f1o often leads to higher food prices, it is important to understand how different products affect overall inflation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bishop said the latest report from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Climate Prediction Centre indicates a 97% probability that a super El Ni\u00f1o will form<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Additionally, it is expected that during the second half of 2026 and the first half of 2027, the event will rank among the strongest recorded since 1950.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She noted that South Africa has experienced several major El Ni\u00f1o events in recent decades, including those in 1991\/92, 2015\/16 and 2023\/24.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of these, the 2015\/16 event was the most severe, triggering the country’s worst drought in 35 years and pushing food price inflation to 18.4%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite this, she explained that not all food categories carry the same weight in South Africa’s Consumer Price Index (CPI).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fish and seafood, for example, account for just 0.43% of the basket, making their impact on headline inflation negligible even when prices rise sharply.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the 2015\/16 El Ni\u00f1o, fish and seafood inflation increased from 8.0% year-on-year to 11.3%, representing a 21.2% increase in the price index. Despite this, Bishop said the category contributed “less than 0.1% to CPI, a negligible outcome.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A similar pattern emerged during the less severe 2023\u201324 El Ni\u00f1o, when fish and seafood prices rose by 11.7%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“This did not register in the CPI inflation outcome either at all,” Bishop said, even though overall consumer inflation increased by 8.3% between the end of 2022 and the end of 2024, while food inflation rose by 11.2%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By comparison, products such as meat and cereals have a much greater influence on inflation because households spend significantly more on them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

South Africa will still experience negative effects <\/h2>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/a>
Investec Chief Economist, Annabel Bishop<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Meat accounts for more than 5% of the CPI basket, while cereal products account for nearly 4.5%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the 2015\/16 drought, cereal inflation accelerated from 4.7% to 17.5% year-on-year, contributing 1.1 percentage points to the 12.3% increase in CPI between the end of 2014 and the end of 2016. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Overall, food and non-alcoholic beverages contributed 3.4 percentage points to inflation during that period, while housing and utilities contributed 3.0 percentage points.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Transport added 1.8 percentage points, and insurance and financial services contributed 1.7 percentage points.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Food prices were not the main driver of the jump in CPI inflation in the 2015-16 El Ni\u00f1o period, contributing only 3.4% of the 12.1% rise in CPI,” Bishop said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She added that food’s importance in the inflation basket has declined over time as household spending patterns have changed. Food and non-alcoholic beverages now account for 18.23% of the CPI basket, down from 25.66% in 2006.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Statistics South Africa noted that this reflected changing household expenditure patterns (as wealth increased and service expenditures grew) and subsequently dropped the overall food weighting to roughly 18% to 20%, depending on the specific index.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bishop also highlighted growing concern over the broader economic and agricultural effects of a stronger El Ni\u00f1o.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The World Meteorological Organisation recently warned that El Ni\u00f1o conditions are forecast to strengthen rapidly over the coming months, increasing the likelihood of heatwaves, droughts, heavy rainfall and other extreme weather events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The organisation added that forecast models show remarkable agreement, providing high confidence in the outlook, while ocean temperatures are expected to exceed 2\u00b0C above average in key monitoring regions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Grain South Africa has also warned that prolonged high temperatures and drought could significantly damage crops.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The organisation said yield reductions during extreme conditions can be as high as 5% per day, meaning that severe heat can quickly lead to substantial crop losses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It also cautioned that an El Ni\u00f1o can be responsible for adverse rainfall conditions in the second part of the summer season, with drought remaining a normal feature of these climate events.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South Africa could face another period of severe weather over the coming months as forecasts point to one of the strongest El Ni\u00f1o events in decades.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":92,"featured_media":864696,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"posted","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"2077406342126420160","_sma_x_attempts":1,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[25744,1498,853],"class_list":["post-866427","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business-opinion","tag-el-nino-2","tag-investec","tag-south-africa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/866427","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/92"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=866427"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/866427\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":866431,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/866427\/revisions\/866431"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/864696"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=866427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=866427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=866427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}