EI Niño has continued to be neutral during the fourth quarter of 2016 and the start of 2017. The eastern tropical Pacific sea surface temperatures have kept cooling between July and January according to the Optimum Interpolation Sea Surface Temperature (OISST). Temperatures are predicted to rise moderately while staying altogether average until the third quarter of 2017 according to the Beijing Climate Center (figure 5.14).

Figure 5.15 illustrates the behavior of the standard Southern Oscillation Index (SOI) of the Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) from January 2016 to January 2017. During the current season, SOI has increased rapidly from -4.3 in October to +2.6 in December, followed by a minor decreased +1.3 in January, 2017, indicating neutral conditions of EI Niño.

NOAA confirms the cooler-than-average sea temperature in the central-eastern tropical Pacific Ocean and that La Niña is no longer present (figure 5.16). BOM and NOAA agree on a neutral EI Niño for 2017. CropWatch will nevertheless keep monitoring EI Niño trends.

Figure 5.14. Tropical Pacific SSTA (Forecasted and Monitored datasets)

Source: http://cmdp.ncc-cma.net/download/ENSO/Variables_evolution/ENSO_SSTA_Patterns_O7P7_20170201.png

Figure 5.15. Monthly SOI-BOM time series for January 2016 to January 2017

Source: http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/current/soi2.shtml

Figure 5.16. Average sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies (℃) for the week centered on February 1, 2017. Anomalies are computed with respect to the 1981-2010 base period weekly means.

Source: http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/enso_advisory/figure01.gif