What impact will El Nino have?The latest situation shows that El Nino causes drought in Vietnam, and the output of crops such as coffee beans will be reduced.
Due to the impact of El Nino weather, Vietnam is currently experiencing the most severe drought in nearly a century, which has severely affected the agricultural industry in the Mekong Delta region. The drought is mainly concentrated in central and southern Vietnam.
According to statistics from the Vietnamese Ministry of Agriculture, the water level of the Mekong River, the longest river in Southeast Asia, has dropped severely, breaking the lowest record since 1926, resulting in severe drought and land salinization in the local area. This also makes nearly a million people in the local area lack daily water, and the most severely affected is the agricultural industry. Currently, 160,000 hectares of planted land have been affected. However, it is estimated locally that in the future, 500,000 hectares may be affected, and in the Mekong Delta, about 2.2 million hectares of arable land, 40%-50% of the land area shows salinization, which will seriously affect the growth of crops, causing physiological drought and even death of plants.
From the perspective of rainfall monitoring, in the past month (from February 14 to March 15), in the areas near the Mekong River basin, such as Laos, Cambodia, and central and southern Vietnam, it has hardly rained, and the temperature is 1-3 ℃ higher than the same period last year. These areas mainly grow coffee trees, rice and other crops, which have a high demand for water, making the drought more and more serious. Moreover, under the influence of El Nino, the rainy season in these areas will be delayed. According to the latest weather forecast, El Nino will end around April, and it will ease the drought situation after the end.
However, Vietnam's main crops, such as rice, coffee, pepper, and rubber, are basically grown in the central and southern regions of the country. Therefore, Vietnam has suffered huge losses. According to the latest research results released by the Vietnam Water Resources Research Institute, due to drought and the exacerbation of salt water levels, the affected areas are expected to suffer related losses of up to 16.6 trillion Vietnamese dong. However, the coffee crops are currently in the blooming season, and drought will affect flowering, and it will be difficult to bear fruit due to insufficient nutrition, which will affect the final yield. Therefore, it is finally predicted that this drought may cause losses of 7 billion Vietnamese dong in Vietnam's national crops.
Moreover, currently, due to the shortage of Robusta stock, the price has been rising. Currently, the spot price of Robusta coffee in Vietnam is as high as 92-95 million Vietnamese dong/ton, which is more than twice that of the same period in 2023, which has also caused chaos in the Vietnamese coffee export market. In addition, Vietnamese coffee is also facing the impact of fruit crops such as durian and dragon fruit. Due to the increasing demand in China in the past two years, many coffee farmers have turned to growing durian, dragon fruit and other fruits, resulting in a reduction in the area of coffee planting in Vietnam. In this regard, industry insiders said that if the yield reduction is severe, the price of Robusta may continue to rise in the future and may exceed 100 million Vietnamese dong/ton.
At present, good news indicates that in addition to El Nino ending around April, the Vietnamese government has requested China to open the sluice of the hydropower station in the upper reaches of the Mekong River, that is, theLancang River area in Yunnan, to relieve the drought. The Chinese government recently decided to respond to Vietnam's request and start the hydropower station to implement emergency water replenishment for 27 days to the downstream to ease the drought in downstream countries such as Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam.
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