Many California cling peach growers will have no place to sell their 2026 crop and may be pulling out trees, even ones recently planted.
During an informational meeting hosted by the County of Sutter Friday, the chief executive officer of the California Peach Canning Association said as many at 50,000 tons of peaches grown in California will have no buyer because the largest canner of California cling peaches has gone bankrupt, canceled contracts, and shuttered its Modesto-based operation.
Del Monte Foods contracted for 74,000 tons of peaches from association members, but only 24,000 tons of peaches will be delivered to other California canneries by association members in 2026, CPCA CEO Rich Hudgins told a standing room only crowd.
“It is a sad day, the end of the Del Monte plant,” Hudgins said.
He said Del Monte purchased 80 percent of the peaches it canned from grower members of the CPCA.
Yuba and Sutter counties combined lead the state in terms of acreage and tonnage of clingstone peaches. In Sutter County alone, 106,000 tons of cling peaches were harvested in 2024 for a value of $66 million.
Kash Gill, a Yuba City banker and peach grower, said during the meeting the the economic hit to farmers locally will be about $30 million this year.
Hudgins said Del Monte filed for bankruptcy on July 1, 2025, and the association worked to make sure all of the contracted peaches were delivered in 2025 and that growers got paid for them.
In August, Del Monte notified growers that none of the long term contracts—some for as long as 20 years—continued to exist.
Some farmers had just planted new orchards and entered into long term contracts but are now not sure they can keep their orchards and wait for solutions that may take seasons to develop.
Pacific Coast Producers, which has canneries in Oroville and Lodi, have entered into contracts to the 24,000 tons this year, but there is no known market for the remaining 50,000 previously under contract with Del Monte.
In January, growers learned there was no buyer for the Modesto cannery, causing a panic and forcing growers to make decisions about what to do with their orchards.
Friday’s meeting was called by county supervisors Jeff Stephens and Karm Bains, both peach growers, as an opportunity for local growers to hear from Hudgins, former United States Department of Agriculture marketing service director Lon Hatamiya (a native of Yuba County), California Assembly member James Gallagher of Yuba City, and U.S. Congress members Mike Thompson, who currently represents the Fourth Congressional District which Yuba, Sutter, and Colusa counties will become part of in 2027.
“I have lived through cannery closures. I have weathered uncertainties, dead and dying trees from too much rain but I have never experience anything of this magnitude,” Stephens told the audience.
“What has happened with Del Monte is devastating. It affects families. It affects multiple generations of operations. It effects employees, truckers, suppliers, and the entire agricultural economy of Sutter County and the surrounding region. The ripple effects will touch well beyond any one orchard.”
Stephens said the point of the meeting was to focus on what comes next.
“I’ve farmed my entire life,” Bains said. “I know what it is like when the ground shifts from under you through no fault of your own. When contracts you counted on disappear, and when crops you planted years ago suddenly have nowhere to go. I’ve seen this kind of destruction before in our valley and I know how it feels to wonder what comes next. But I also know this, we are stronger when we work together to find solutions and that is why we are here.
Hudgins said the peach canning association has a $550 million claim with the bankruptcy court over the canceled contracts but expects very little of that to be covered by the sale of assets.
He said the Del Monte plant in Modesto has an estimated value of only $45 million.
The association is working with federal officials to determine what kind of financial assistance might be available through the USDA, which has provided a measure of relief to growers during previous cannery closures.
“I can tell you it is imperative that we receive some kind of financial assistance from the USDA,” he said.
Hatamiya said he has offered his knowledge of the USDA programs and encouraged growers to press their elected officials in Sacramento and Washington, D.C. to work toward relief.
“We’re not the only ones facing these challenges, if you look across the country you’re seeing processing plants closing, acreage being pulled out. Forty thousand acres of vineyards were pulled out of California just last year alone.
“This is a devastating issue for farmers not having a contract,” Gallagher said, indicating he is looking for an opportunity to keep the Modesto plant operating.
“Family farms, farm workers, truckers, suppliers, the entire community. Downtown business and every charitable organization throughout the community will feel the hit from this,” Congress member Thompson said. Thompson said he has been working with USDA to find every available option to immediately address the issue, including disaster programs that currently exist or need to be created through new legislation.
Thompson says there are USDA funds available for a cooperative effort to keep the Modesto plant running, but the longer it sits unused the harder that becomes.
“I understand the pitters have already been sold,” he said. We’ve seen this in other industries. When sawmills began to close on the north coast the first thing that happened was China came to town and bought all the equipment, sent it back to China, so those mills were never going to be opened again.”