Coming El Niño exposes Sadc's debt dilemma

Share current article via Email Share current article via Facebook Share current article via Twitter Share current article via LinkedIn A woman fetches drinking water from an unprotected well in Zimbabwe during the previous El Nino-induced drought. Picture: As the Southern African Development Community (Sadc) braces for what forecasters warn could be a potentially devastating super El Niño in the 2026/27 season, a stark reality emerges. The region is not merely preparing for a climate shock; it is entering this perfect storm with one hand tied behind its back by a crushing burden of sovereign debt. The ability of Sadc states to protect their citizens from an imminent hunger crisis is severely compromised by the very financial structures meant to underpin their development. The warning from Sadc executive secretary Elias Magosi is stark. Seasonal forecasts indicate a high likelihood of an El Niño that could surpass the intensity of the devastating 2023/24 El Niño. This is not a distant environmental concern but an immediate threat to food security. For a region where the majority of the population relies on rain-fed subsistence farming, the impact of drought , extreme heat and erratic rainfall will be catastrophic. We are staring at a potential 75% increase in acute food insecurity across Southern Africa. To its credit, Sadc has recognised this human security threat and has called for a paradigm shift from reactive disaster response to proactive resilience. The proposed solutions are sound: investment in early warning systems, climate-resilient infrastructure and disaster-risk financing. However, these prescriptions ring hollow in the face of the region's fiscal reality. Sadc's own macroeconomic convergence targets, a set of guidelines designed to foster stability, recommend that member states maintain public debt at or below 60% of GDP. This threshold, intended to create a fiscal buffer for macroeconomic shocks, has been consistently and dangerously breached by many of the very nation's most vulnerable to an El Niño cycle. Consider the scale of the Sadc debt reality. South Africa's government debt-to-GDP ratio currently stands at about 78.5%, leaving the National Treasury with little room to fund an emergency response without further compromising its fiscal position. Mozambique's debt is even higher, at roughly 76.9%, while Mauritius and Namibia are saddled with ratios above 70%, at 86% and 70.2%, respectively. Zambia, still recovering from a debt default, is burdened with a ratio exceeding 60%. These are far beyond abstract numbers. They represent a crushing reality where a significant portion of the national budgets of vulnerable Sadc states is diverted to servicing loans, rather than investing in the water infrastructure, drought-resistant seeds and social safety nets desperately needed to withstand the coming dry season. The contradiction is ultimately laid bare. To effectively manage the inflationary pressures of an El Niño-induced food price spike, a co-ordinated policy response between central banks, treasuries and regional bodies is essential. But how can governments co-ordinate a robust response when their fiscal arsenals are empty? The very act of borrowing to fund resilience measures for the poorest could breach international lending agreements and further destabilise already fragile and emerging economies. As climate justice movements have rightly argued, finance for adaptation and loss-and-damage should come as grants and low-interest loans, not as loans that tighten the debt trap. To effectively manage the inflationary pressures of an El Niño-induced food price spike, a co-ordinated policy response between central banks, treasuries and regional bodies is essential. But how can governments co-ordinate a robust response when their fiscal arsenals are empty? Resilience will always enjoy a higher threshold where there is enough fiscal space to respond to such climate-induced macroeconomic shock. In a region and continent that grapples with some of the highest debt burdens globally, it is almost expected that little to no fiscal space exists. The disaster and shock is further complicated by the reality that millions of people who call the Sadc region home are reliant on small-scale farming to often generate an income and feed their families. Ultimately, all-out mobilisation of resources that places emphasis on concessional finance for adaptation, underscoring the need to mobilise private investment and strengthen domestic financing mechanisms, holds the key to mitigating against this unavoidable environmental, economic and social reality. At COP30 in Belém (2025), the parties reaffirmed that Sub-Saharan Africa remains one of the most climate-exposed regions, with annual adaptation needs projected at $310bn-$365bn by the early 2030s, compared to current flows of about $26bn. These are frankly enormous figures for largely small and concentrated economies. The 2026/27 El Niño will not just be a test of the region's agricultural resilience; it will be a brutal audit of its fiscal management. Without meaningful debt relief and a fundamental shift towards grant-based climate finance, the region will be forced to choose between paying its creditors and feeding its people. This is a crisis of Sadc's own making, exacerbated by an uneven global financial architecture that fails to account for the unique vulnerabilities of nations that have contributed the least to the climate crisis but are being asked to bear its heaviest cost. • Kinnes is a member of the UN Inter-regional Crime & Justice Research Institute expert working group.