“That’s why the crops are here” - Perceptions on extreme weather events and grape growing in Brazil’s semi-arid region

Extreme weather threatens global grape production, which depends on an annual harvest cycle. Unlike most viticultural regions, grape cultivation in the São Francisco River Valley (SFRV), northeastern Brazil, requires irrigation, a condition that enables two annual harvests and has attracted investment in recent decades. Although the region presents predictable dry seasons, an extended drought from 2011 to 2019 severely affected agriculture and livelihoods in the Brazilian semi‑arid zone. Amid ongoing climate change, we hypothesize that growers within Public Irrigation Projects (PIPs) perceive themselves as relatively water secure, potentially reducing their sensitivity to drought severity. Using Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) and in-depth interviews, we documented stakeholders’ recollections of extreme years and their perceived impacts on viticulture and daily life, contextualized by river flow dynamics and observed precipitation. Growers identified intense rainfall during expected wet periods as more harmful to production than extreme dryness. Multilevel governance of the São Francisco River—particularly releases from the Sobradinho Reservoir and irrigation districts—has buffered local water supply from regional declines, shifting the main production risk toward intensified rainfall and overlapping hazards that require coordinated, multi-level adaptation.