a day ago
Peach farmers in B.C.'s Okanagan optimistic for 2025 after years of climate disaster
Two peach farmers in B.C.'s Okanagan region say they're optimistic for the upcoming harvest after years of climate disasters wreaking havoc on their crops.
B.C.'s farmers have been particularly affected by climate disasters over the last few years, with a heat dome in 2021 cooking fruit on the branches, and two subsequent cold snaps in the winter. One of those, in 2024, led to the destruction of a year's worth of crops in some areas.
But now, two stone fruit farmers in the Okanagan Valley say they hope the push to buy local helps them as they look forward to a productive peach crop later this summer.
Jennifer Deol, the owner of There and Back Again Farms in Kelowna, says she hasn't had a full crop of peaches since 2021.
"It has been hard to survive these past four years, but we're just grateful," she told CBC News.
"This season we've got fruit on the trees and the trees are looking healthy — the trees that did survive the winter of 2024."
Deol says she grows over 20 different varieties of peaches over three acres (1.21 hectares) of farmland, and her farm's peaches have a bit of a cult following in Alberta and Saskatchewan.
Another farmer, Balkar Hans of the Hans Estate Vineyards and Orchards in nearby Keremeos, B.C., estimates that the upcoming harvest would amount to 75 to 85 per cent of what he considered a perfect year.
He says that his peach trees have been damaged by the years of climate disaster but have bounced back in 2025.
"It's exciting to have a season where you're looking forward to actually harvesting something," he said.
"We've had a few years of zero harvest and that puts us in pretty strenuous times and [a] stressful mindset, right?"
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B.C.'s farmers lost $457M in 2024, the most in Canada
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Duration 2:49
It's been a tough few years for farmers, and the past year might have been especially bad. New data from Statistics Canada shows B.C.'s farmers lost nearly half a billion dollars last year, the worst net loss in the country. As Brady Strachan reports, the B.C. Agriculture Council is warning that without more support, the future of local food production is at risk.
B.C. farmers lost $456.9 million in 2024, according to Statistics Canada, with the province's agricultural sector suffering the largest net loss in Canada last year.
Hans said he hopes that a push to buy locally produced goods — in light of U.S. tariffs on Canada — would help after the harvest begins in a few weeks in the Okanagan.
Deol echoed that thought, and says she's already seen a sentiment to buy local early in the summer.
"A lot of people are very hungry to support local, support businesses, and we're hoping that momentum sticks through the summer and into the fall because fruit season is just beginning," she said.
