In spite of a declining trend during the current monitoring period, the strong El Niño still persists. CropWatch monitored the following typical climate anomalies associated with El Niño events: positive temperature anomalies in Northeast China and southAsia, the negative precipitation anomalies in North Australia and maritime south-east Asia, drought in central and northern south America, positive precipitation anomalies in Argentina and Peru, and especially drought in southern Africa.

Figure5.x1 illustrates the behavior of the Southern Oscillation Index (SOI) of the Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) from January 2015 to December 2015. Sustained negative values of SOI below -7 may usually indicate an EI Niño event, while sustained positive values above +7 are typical of La Niña. Values within the range (-7 to +7) indicate neutral conditions. During the current season, SOI has increased to -5.3 in November, 2015, indicating a declining trend.

Figure5.x1

NASA repor