Due to an unprecedented meteorological event, the UK is likely to experience wetter and stormier conditions in the coming autumn and early winter, the Met Office said.
The El Niño event – when sea temperatures in the tropical eastern Pacific rise 0.5°C above the long-term average – is forecast to reach more than 3°C in the coming months, making this year’s event “the largest since the 19th century”, the forecaster said.
The Environment Secretary, Dame Angela Eagle, said people in the UK should prepare for an increased risk of national weather emergencies.
She told The Guardian: “We’re about to experience probably the largest El Niño that has ever been seen, and that will lead to drier summers, wetter winters, with more extreme storms in this country.
“It will do a lot more damage in Asia with flooding, and therefore, I think that we need to take it seriously.
“If you’ve got a store of a bit of food that can keep you going for a while before the emergency services can get to you, you’re going to be a lot better off than if you haven’t. So some of it is that kind of preparation for just being a bit more resilient.”
The extreme weather may also put pressure on global food supplies, including those reaching Britain. UK think tank Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit said in a recent report that the countries most likely to be exposed to extreme weather were the source of 13 per cent of UK food imports.
This means supplies of rice, for which India is the UK’s biggest supplier, citrus fruits from South Africa and Peru, coffee from Brazil and tea from Kenya could all be affected.
The regions more likely to be affected by these phenomena are North and South America, Central America, Africa, Europe, Asia and Australia, the European Commission said in June.