ers say the meeting in the central farming town of Kadoma will discuss unfolding weather patterns and their impact on the agriculture-driven region which was devastated by a severe drought in 1992. The major issue is the havoc that has been sown by El Nino -- a freak weather phenomenon that has been rapidly building up in the southern Pacific since April. El Nino is an abnormal state of the ocean-atmosphere system in the tropical Pacific which triggers exceptionally warm and long-lived ocean currents, disrupting global rainfall and wind patterns and causes droughts or flooding in far-flung regions. It has already been blamed for severe drought in eastern Australia, dry weather in the Philippines and Indonesia, and unusually wet weather in Chile. Warm currents from the growing El Nino - Spanish for "The Child" and named after Jesus by Peruvian fishermen because it peaks around Christmas -- have swept tropical and subtropical fish to the normally cold waters of northern California, and scientists have warned the state of devastating floods and mudslides. The El Nino's effects

have also savaged maize crops in South East Asia, especially Java. Forecasters predict it will bring a severe drought to some parts of southern Africa, particularly in South Africa and Zimbabwe where the last major drought in 1992 shrunk its economy by about 12 percent that year. The Climatology Research Group of South Africa's University of Witwatersrand concurs and said in a recent statement: "If the El Nino continues to develop as forecast, there is a strong possibility of dry conditions". The 12-nation Southern African Development Community (SADC) is already urging its members to implement vital water-conservation policies and to ensure they have enough food stocks in case there is a drought.