After fires, France faces problems with tourism and wine harvesting

In southwest France, the flames are easing, but the damage is still spreading.

Over the last few weeks, wildfires have torn through forests, destroyed homes and forced hundreds of thousands of people to flee – but away from the fire front, businesses across Bordeaux and the Atlantic coast are counting the cost.

At the height of the crisis, tourists were warned to stay away. Many did, and they're slow to return. And in a region where hotels, restaurants and shops rely heavily on the summer season. That matters.

"Near the bay and all these places, it's pretty terrible because commerce is everything," Bordeaux resident Jaen tells CGTN.

"The shops make most of their figures during the summer. It's seasonal. If you remove that, how long can they last?"

The impact has spread far beyond the fire zone. Peggy Plouhinec, managing director of Château Picque Caillou, says warnings issued during the emergency led to empty hotels, restaurants and tourist sites across the Gironde area.

"The prefect's warnings in Gironde have made tourists desert the region," she tells CGTN.

"Economically, it's very complicated for hotels and restaurants and, by extension, obviously, the Château, which is receiving far fewer people for visits and tourism."

For Bordeaux's wine industry, fewer visitors are just part of the problem, with weeks of searing heat and drought causing the grapes to change.

The hot weather has sped up the ripening process, increased the level of alcohol and lowered the acidity. The grapes are smaller too, meaning there's less wine, even if the quality remains strong.

"The wines can become a little more alcoholic and a little less acidic," says Stéphane Yves, who's the technical manager at Château Picque Caillou.

"That was something we once tried to achieve in Bordeaux because the grapes sometimes lacked maturity. But today, it can be too much."

He says growers may now need to harvest earlier or even change the way they make wine, to try and protect the balance Bordeaux is renowned for.

"We have to adapt," he says.

And while the fire emergency is easing, the conditions behind this crisis remain.

"There won't be many places where we can say that we are climate secure," climate expert Aurélien Sebton tells CGTN. "Global warming is global."

For Bordeaux, the damage stretches far beyond the land that's been reduced to ash.

It means bringing tourists back, protecting one of the world's most famous wine regions and adapting an economy built around summer… for a climate that's becoming much more difficult to predict.