El Niño and man-made climate change will cause a record number of environmental disasters in Latin America in 2023, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), a UN agency, said on Wednesday.
Last year was the warmest on record in the region, according to the report, which noted that sea level rise and glacier retreat continued while a “major shift” in the distribution of Rainfall in the subcontinent has caused droughts, wildfires, floods and landslides.
“Unfortunately, 2023 was a year of record climate disasters in Latin America and the Caribbean,” said Celeste Saulo, Secretary General of WMO, quoted in a press release.
In 2023, 67 episodes of weather, hydrological and climate disasters were reported in the region.
Of these, 77% were linked to storms and floods, says the WMO report, which draws on data from the Center for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED).
Among the climate disasters of 2023, the WMO cites in particular Hurricane Otis, which devastated the Mexican seaside resort of Acapulco in October, causing at least 45 deaths and millions in damage.
The WMO attributes the increase in these extreme events to the combination of El Niño and the consequences of human-induced climate change.
The agency describes El Niño as a natural weather phenomenon associated with ocean surface warming in the tropical Pacific, which typically occurs every two to seven years and lasts between nine and 12 months.
2023, the hottest year on record
The organization also mentioned the intense drought that hit the region, which caused the Rio Negro, one of the tributaries of the Amazon, to record its lowest level in more than 120 years of measurements, and that the Maritime traffic through the Panama Canal has been “severely” disrupted since August.
In addition, the drought in the La Plata basin affected northern Argentina and southern Brazil and hit Uruguay hard, which experienced the driest summer in 42 years and a lack of water screaming.
The WMO adds to this the scourge of torrential rains which caused dozens of deaths following landslides and floods, both in the south-east of Brazil in February and in Jamaica, Haiti and the Republic Dominican in November.
Last week, the south of Brazil was again hit by torrential rains which left 100 dead, according to the latest report.
In 2023, the average temperature was the highest ever recorded in Latin America and the Caribbean: it exceeded the average of the 1991-2020 period by 0.82°C and that of the 1991-2020 period by 1.39°C. reference 1961-1990, WMO said.
In Mexico, the fastest warming country in the region, the boreal summer was exceptionally hot, with a maximum of 51.4°C in August.
Central South America experienced scorching heat from August to December. In certain regions of Brazil, the thermometer reached 41°C in August, in the middle of the southern winter.
Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Paraguay and Peru recorded their highest temperatures for a month in September and major forest fires broke out in several places.
The WMO has warned of accelerating sea level rise.
According to the report, in Chile, the Echaurren Norte glacier, a reference glacier for the World Glacier Monitoring Service (WGMS), lost approximately 31 meters of water equivalent between 1975 and 2023.
Furthermore, the WMO deemed the weather and climate services provided in Latin America and the Caribbean “insufficient”.
However, she highlighted “progress made in increasing the resilience of the health sector to climate change”, noting that in 12 of the 35 countries in the region, WMO has made “significant progress” in the provision of meteorological services. and climate.
