After operating in the Okanagan Valley for nearly nine decades, BC Tree Fruits cooperative notified growers Friday of its dissolution and sought a court order to liquidate its assets.

The cooperative, made up of more than 230 farming families, is perhaps best known to consumers for its green leaf logo, which has adorned fruit packaging and apple stickers for decades as a sign of high-quality fruit grown in British Columbia.

Members were informed by email that the cooperative would stop accepting fruit at its packing facilities starting Friday, and growers were advised to “immediately seek another alternative for marketing their fruit for the remainder of the 2024 season.”

In a written statement, the company cited “extremely low expected fruit volumes, weather influences and difficult market and financial conditions” as reasons for the dissolution of the cooperative.

This news comes at a time when many fruit growers in the Okanagan Valley are facing catastrophic crop losses due to this winter’s extreme weather conditions, which wiped out almost the entire valley’s peach, apricot and nectarine crops and severely damaged cherry orchards.

Producers should find new buyers for their fruit

With the apple harvest for some varieties in the Okanagan Valley just weeks away, the cooperative’s members are now faced with the task of finding a buyer for their crop.

“It’s shocking. It’s really sad,” said Parminder Saini, whose family grows apples in West Kelowna.

The closure of the BC Tree Fruits Cooperative comes as farmers in the Okanagan face catastrophic crop losses of peaches, apricots and nectarines this year. (Tom Popyk / CBC)

“What do we do next? How do we harvest our fruit? How do we get it to a place where it can be stored refrigerated? How does it get from the cold storage to the stores?”

BC Tree Fruits did not respond to an interview with CBC News, but said in the statement that the cooperative and its subsidiaries are now “seeking court orders and assistance to liquidate the cooperative in order to obtain maximum compensation for all parties involved.”

Iconic branding

The dissolution of the producer cooperative marks the end of almost nine decades of business activity for BC Tree Fruits.

Founded in 1936, BC Tree Fruits has expanded its operations to include a grower’s operation, a fresh fruit market in Kelowna and, in 2014, a cider factory bearing the BC Tree Fruits logo.

BC Tree Fruits’ iconic green leaf logo has been used for decades by the Kelowna-based fruit growers’ cooperative to market British Columbia-grown fruit in grocery stores across Canada. (Province of BC)

In recent years, however, the cooperative has faced financial challenges and resistance from a large portion of its member producers to decisions taken by the board.

In 2022, BC Tree Fruits closed its fruit packing plant in Lake Country, forcing growers in the Central and North Okanagan to ship their fruit to Oliver in the South Okanagan.

Challenge for business relocations

In protest, Saini and other growers tried unsuccessfully to dissolve the board of directors at an extraordinary general meeting of the cooperative.

“All these measures could have changed if we had won the vote back then, but unfortunately we didn’t,” Saini said.

BC Tree Fruits is dissolving its 88-year-old grower-owned cooperative and subsidiaries, including its fruit market in Kelowna, BC (Google Maps).

Kelowna-based apple grower and former board member Amarjit Lalli is also critical of the direction BC Tree Fruits has taken in recent years, including the move to the Oliver packinghouse and the sell-off of the co-op’s assets.

“It was one mistake after another,” he said.

“There’s a lot going on behind the scenes. The government needs to step in and do a full audit and investigation into the demise of BC Tree Fruits.”

Difficulty finding fruit packers

Following the sudden collapse of the cooperative, Lalli and other fruit growers are meeting this weekend to discuss how to get their fruit to market this year, he said.

“The private packers do not have the capacity to pack all this fruit,” said Lalli.

“They will take some of it, but not all of it, and it will be a devastating year for some producers.”

Both Lalli and Saini are calling on the British Columbia government to intervene and support farmers.

In a written statement to CBC News, British Columbia Minister of Agriculture and Food Pam Alexis said ministry staff have “engaged and consulted with British Columbia’s fruit-growing sector to understand the impacts.”

“Our government has supported the tree fruit industry through a tree fruit stabilization plan, which included supporting leadership changes at the BC Tree Fruit cooperative,” Alexis wrote.

Alexis said the province will continue to work with growers and the BC Fruit Growers Association to understand the impact of the decision to dissolve the cooperative.