American scientists have officially confirmed the start of El Niño - the climate phenomenon that every few years flips the weather patterns across half the planet. And this time the forecast is no gentle one: there is a 63 percent chance it will be "very strong", with the Pacific surface warming by over 2 degrees above average, and some models going past 3.

The phenomenon was confirmed by the American oceanographic agency NOAA, and the Japanese meteorological service agreed. The Australian bureau, with stricter criteria, is for now holding off on official confirmation - but the facts are on the table: the sea surface temperature in the central and tropical Pacific has crossed the threshold that defines El Niño.

What does that mean for the world? Very strong episodes usually lift the global temperature by around 0.2 degrees. Combined with the climate change already under way, the forecast is that 2027 will be exceptionally hot - perhaps even over 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels, the very threshold the world has spent years negotiating over whether it will cross.

The consequences aren't abstract. Floods in Peru, Ecuador, East Africa and Central Asia, droughts and fires in Australia and Indonesia, a weaker hurricane season in the Atlantic. And where it hits hardest - in agriculture - the bill arrives in the form of failed harvests and pricier food on the shelves.

And here is the part the Balkans understands well, even without a scientific model. When the weather goes mad somewhere far away, the price of bread and vegetables here doesn't ask where it happened. Global warming stopped being a chart at a conference long ago - it's a line on the supermarket bill. The only question is when we'll stop being surprised every single time.