Farmers in California are in crisis: ‘Costs are too high; we can’t keep this up for long’

Water and climate change

Further south, at Terranova Ranch – a 3,260-hectare estate in Helm, in the San Joaquin Valley, the southern part of the Central Valley – Don Cameron has seen 45 years of harvests come and go. To irrigate the estate’s 25 different crops, the manager of this agri-food empire has tackled the water challenge with colossal, pioneering projects, becoming a celebrity in the American agricultural world, drawing on both capital from the company – owned by a Swiss trust – and state public funds. Terranova Ranch relies on groundwater in an area of the valley at serious risk of water scarcity. Cameron has spent decades building artificial canals and pumping stations to capture rainwater that can ‘recharge’ the aquifer; he is tackling the increasingly scorching temperatures that are transforming the crop cycle: ‘We plant tomatoes as early as the end of February to reduce exposure to the extreme heat of the summers.’ But the challenge of such sudden inflation was not on the horizon. ‘Diesel prices are killing us. They’ve risen by around 87 per cent; fertiliser prices by 23 per cent, whilst crop prices had been negotiated before the surge. A tanker load of diesel that used to cost 20–25 thousand dollars now costs us 50 thousand or more. We can’t carry on like this for much longer.’ An equally challenging obstacle is the labour force. ‘We had an open-borders policy,’ Cameron summarises. ‘Now, due to a shortage of workers, many farms will struggle to sow their crops.’

Tariffs lead to a loss of market share

Craig McNamara runs Sierra Orchards, a family business based in Winters in the northern Central Valley. The son of the long-serving Secretary of Defence Robert is a force of nature. The successes achieved through increasingly sustainable farming practices are being undermined by the difficulties created by the government’s decisions. “It wasn’t enough,” he says, “that we were facing recurring trade wars – with their negative impact on walnut and almond exports due to retaliatory tariffs imposed by India, one of our main export markets, in response to the steel and aluminium tariffs imposed by the first Trump administration. The second presidential term is hitting us hard, every single day, and the instability is mounting.” On the estate’s 180 hectares, diversification has become vital, so alongside the walnuts, almonds are now growing, as well as rotational crops. ‘We’ve lost market share, first and foremost in India and then in the Middle East. As farmers, we have a tradition of resilience, yet now I’m losing it.’ Above all, however, global warming looms large. ‘When we talk about climate change, we’re talking about water. Without water, we won’t have to worry about immigration, regulations or harvests any more. It’s game over.’

Wine exports plummet, but the domestic market holds steady

Beyond the Vaca Mountains, across the plains of the Central Valley, and even in the renowned Napa Valley – the treasure trove of Californian wines – the renewed tariffs have taken their toll. At the St. Supéry estate, founded in 1982 by French winegrowers and acquired by Chanel in 2015, the prized Sauvignon Blanc and Cabernet Sauvignon are destined primarily for the domestic market, as is all Californian wine, of which only 10–15 per cent of production is exported. By 2025, US wine exports (95 per cent of which come from California) had plummeted by 34.5 per cent. The largest share of the decline came from Canada, which fell from 36 per cent to 12 per cent of total overseas sales. Whilst Donald Trump was threatening to annex the United States’ northern neighbours, Canadian consumers stopped drinking Californian wines.