Brazil’s state agricultural research agency has submitted 163 climate risk management measures to the national government, ahead of El Nino conditions expected during the 2026-27 growing season. The Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuaria, widely known as Embrapa, delivered the package to the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock this month.
The submission splits into three groups. Fourteen measures apply across sectors, 139 are tailored to specific crops or farming sectors, and ten focus on broader policy. Together they target drought, extreme heat, storms, frost and fire risk, hazards Embrapa expects to sharpen as El Nino conditions build toward next year’s planting season.
From reaction to anticipation
Embrapa is pressing for a change in how Brazilian agriculture handles climate shocks. Rather than responding to each drought or storm as it hits, the agency wants a permanent culture of risk-anticipation built into farm planning. That means treating climate exposure as a standing input to decisions, not an emergency to manage after the fact.
Cultivar research sits at the centre of that approach. Developing crop varieties bred for drought tolerance, heat resistance and shorter cycles gives farmers options before a bad season arrives, rather than after losses are already counted. Embrapa has long run breeding programmes across staple crops, and the new package leans further into that work as a climate defence rather than a purely productivity tool.
Financing is the other pillar. The package calls for climate-adaptation funding mechanisms that let farmers invest in resilience ahead of time, covering irrigation, soil management and insurance products geared to weather risk. Without accessible financing, Embrapa argues, even well-designed cultivars and forecasting tools go underused on the ground.
El Nino’s reach this year extends well beyond Brazil, with the same climate pattern already pushing acute hunger higher across six African countries in the Global South. Brazilian officials have not linked the two directly, but the timing underscores how a single ocean-atmosphere event can strain food systems on different continents at once.
Stakes for a major exporter
Brazil ranks among the world’s largest producers of soybeans, maize, sugar and coffee, so climate disruption to its farm sector carries consequences well past its own borders. A poor harvest driven by drought or untimely frost can move global commodity prices and affect buyers far from South America.
The 2026-27 season is still months away, giving the ministry time to review Embrapa’s proposals before planting begins. How many of the 163 measures reach implementation, and how quickly, will determine whether Brazilian farms enter the El Nino period better prepared than in previous cycles.
Embrapa has not published a detailed timeline for adopting the measures, and the ministry has yet to respond formally to the submission. For now, the package stands as a marker of intent, an attempt to move Brazilian agriculture away from managing climate disasters after they strike and toward planning for them years in advance.
