Beyond ENSO : Temperature, Rainfall Variability and Emerging Climate Risks in Belize

Despite the widespread assumption that El Niño‐Southern Oscillation (ENSO) dominates climate variability across Central America, its localized influence on individual nations remains poorly quantified. For small, agriculture‐dependent countries like Belize, establishing this relationship from station‐level observations is critical for designing effective adaptation strategies and climate‐smart agricultural planning. This study presents a multi‐decadal (1975–2024) analysis of daily temperature and precipitation records from seven long‐term meteorological stations in Belize, a country where systematic, station‐based ENSO assessments remain scarce. Station observations are validated against ERA5 reanalysis, confirming their regional representativeness across the national network. It aims to evaluate ENSO's influence on local climate variability and place national trends in a broader regional context. Results reveal that ENSO's influence on Belizean rainfall is negligible across all stations and seasons (correlations below | r | = 0.10, explaining less than 1% of variance), even during the late wet season when ENSO teleconnections are theoretically strongest. Spatial analysis of gridded reanalysis fields shows that the ENSO signal is field significant in the regional atmosphere over Belize but does not project onto local rainfall, which instead covaries with the surrounding sea surface, consistent with an indirect, ocean‐mediated pathway rather than a direct atmospheric teleconnection. Temperature shows a clearer but still modest ENSO link, particularly for nighttime minimum values during the dry season ( r up to 0.36). The Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO) emerges as a stronger driver of temperature variability than ENSO at six of seven stations, explaining 16% versus 4% of variance. Independent of ENSO, Belize has experienced sustained warming of +0.2°C to +0.5°C per decade, with asymmetric nighttime warming amplifying agricultural heat stress risks. Extreme heat days have increased by +3.5 to +11.9 days per decade, with acceleration during El Niño years suggesting compounding future risks. Rainfall records show declining rain day frequency without proportional decreases in totals, indicating intensifying precipitation events that increase flood risk. These findings challenge prevailing ENSO‐centric assumptions and demonstrate that nation‐specific, multi‐driver analyses are essential for informing adaptation strategies in vulnerable Caribbean nations. The empirical thresholds and trend estimates derived here provide an evidence base for national early warning systems, agricultural planning frameworks, and heat health guidelines in Belize.