Australian wheat production, expected to slide this year from a record high 2011/12 season, could be further exacerbated as the country's weather bureau confirmed on Tuesday the emergence of the El Niño weather phenomenon.

While the development of an El Niño delayed in the second half of July, "over the past fortnight indicators such as the Southern Oscillation Index (a gauge of atmospheric pressure) and trade wind strength have shown renewed trends that are consistent with the early stages of an El Nino event," the Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) said.

Such indications could be a blow to the nation's agriculture sector, moreso that Australia has been forecast to be this year's world's second-biggest wheat exporter again, but analysts remained positive Australia would be able to weather out the disturbance.

"In New South Wales, the soil moisture going into May was exceptional because of the summer rain, and while there has been some frost, there some areas of New South Wales which don't need another drink," analyst Andrew Woodhouse said in Reuters News.

The same, however, could not be said of South Australia's wheat crop.

"I have downgraded my South Australia wheat forecast by nearly a million tonnes to 2.86 million tonnes," Woodhouse said.

Mr Woodhouse expects that overall wheat output in the current crop year will hit only 22.56 million tonnes.

"At the moment, the ocean is looking El Nino-like, but the atmosphere is still not playing ball," Andrew Watkins, climate manager at the BOM, said.

"Most likely the El Nino will be a relatively weak event in the grand scheme," he said.

However, Mr Watkins does not want to issue false hopes the emerging El Niño would only give out a low impact.

"Weak events have had strong impacts in Australia like 2006/07 was not a particularly strong event but had a strong impact on Australia," he said.

Read more:

Australia Ought to Brace for Possible El Niño Weather Pattern

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