Extreme weather, including torrential monsoon downpours and a powerful typhoon, reduced rubber production levels in Asia and sent prices soaring to 13-year highs, according to Reuters.
What's happening?
A series of extreme weather events for regions that rely on rubber trees for rubber production hit the industry hard this year. First came a prolonged drought that dragged on for at least three months. Temperatures in Thailand climbed well over 100 degrees as a heat wave scorched Southeast Asia in April. That was followed by devastating monsoonal floods that killed dozens and caused an estimated $1.3 billion in agriculture losses.
Southeast Asia was still recovering from the flooding when the record-breaking Typhoon Yagi made landfall in China. It was the strongest storm to hit the country in a decade. At its peak, the Category 5 hurricane had maximum sustained winds of 160 miles, per the Washington Post.
The hurricane made landfall in China's Hainan Province in early September. Yagi damaged 16,000 hectares (almost 40,000 acres) of rubber trees in the major source region of Hainan, according to Reuters. That represented about 2.1% of China's total rubber area, per data from WhatNext Rubber cited in the report.
"These fluctuations can drastically impact the tapping frequency of rubber trees and overall latex production," Farah Miller, the founder of Helixtap, a company that deals with rubber industry data, told Reuters.
Helixtap estimates that Thailand accounts for about a third of global rubber production, per Reuters. However, the impacts of the extreme weather, which included a large number of days during the peak harvest season disrupted by excessive rain and floods, took a toll. Helixtap estimated the country would see a production decline of 10% to 15%.
Why is extreme weather raising rubber prices in Asia so important?
Our warming world played a big part in the extreme weather events that have challenged the rubber-growing regions of Asia. Scientists with World Weather Attribution say our overheating planet increased the frequency and severity of deadly heat waves that affected millions of highly vulnerable people in the region.
"We observe a strong climate change signal in the 2024 April mean temperature," a WWA analysis noted. "We find that these extreme temperatures are now about 45 times more likely and 0.85ºC hotter. These results align with our previous studies, where we found that climate change made the extreme heat about 30 times more likely and 1ºC hotter."
Climate Impacts Tracker Asia is another organization that publishes in-depth studies that identify the causes of changing global temperatures and its impact locally and globally.
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"Research shows that storms like Typhoon Yagi are becoming more intense due to human-driven climate change, primarily driven by the burning of coal, oil, and gas for energy," CITA wrote. "Analysis by scientists at ClimaMeter found that tropical depressions near Vietnam are now up to 20% wetter and 5% windier than in previous decades due to climatic changes."
What's being done about our warming world's influence on extreme weather events?
Heat-trapping gases are raising the world's temperature and the risk of many types of extreme weather. People in vulnerable parts of the world need our help, and raising awareness is one way to take action. To start, we can use our voices to get the message out by talking about climate issues with our friends and family.
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