Every now and then farmers glance down to see what’s happening below the equator. By “below the equator,” I mean Brazil.
We have gradually resigned ourselves to Brazil being the leader, but last year they also took the top spot for corn exports, a tougher fact to swallow. But there is more going on down there. For example, while we have been coping with the effects of the new El Nino, it’s going to mess with the 2023-2024 growing season downstairs as well.
The Economist provided a helpful chart to predict the weather patterns climate models are currently offering. This map notes wetter, drier and warmer regions of South America. Maybe there weren’t any cooler-than-average areas, or with the continent straddling the equator, cooler is a relative term with less meaning. Anyway, if we’ve learned anything this year, warmer than average can mean way hotter for way longer.
I noticed a couple of curious things. Bolivia is predicted to enjoy both drier and wetter-than-average conditions during the growing season. Overall, it could be a tough growing season for Brazil, with heat in the south and most of the country possibly drier much of the time. The strength of the current El Nino coupled with already record warm ocean temperatures suggests the headlines will just keep coming from the south.
Meanwhile, something weird is going on in the Antarctic. Basically, it’s losing ice, whole countries of it — the ice loss divergence from average compares with Argentina or Texas. I find those analogies unhelpful, merely planting an image of Argentina floating around in the ocean in my head.
This year the sea ice minimum broke the record that had stood since ... last year. Some of us have been zeroed in on the North Pole, since it’s all ocean, and Antarctica had been relatively stable as far as ice was concerned. Until recently, anyway.
I have no dramatic conclusions to draw from these maps, but just like the record low temps in Australia during their winter, they suggest to me the U.S. Corn Belt was part of the fortunate few places to avoid the most intense weather this growing season. So far.
