Gov. Gavin Newsom signed AB 2706 on Sept. 30, retiring California’s cannery license — on the books since 1925 — and replacing it with a registration regime for acidified and low-acid foods. The bill, by Assemblymember Esmeralda Soria, is Chapter 960, Statutes of 2026. It passed without a recorded no vote: 78–0 in the Assembly on concurrence and 40–0 in the Senate.
Under the new article, a person may not commercially manufacture, process or pack an acidified food or a low-acid food for human or animal consumption without a “scheduled process” — a process established and validated by a recognized processing authority — and must register with the California Department of Public Health. The bill digest states the prohibition plainly: no commercial manufacturing, processing or packing “without a scheduled process.” A $350 annual fee applies to covered producers on top of standard registration costs.
The categories are broad in practice. Acidified foods cover pickles, salsas, hot sauces, relishes and marinated vegetables. Low-acid canned foods cover most jarred vegetables, broths, and meat and bean products. Those are staple products for small-batch makers and for vendors at certified farmers markets across Southern California.
What the law does not clearly say is who falls outside it. The digest and the published bill summaries describe the rule as applying to “commercial manufacturing, processing, or packing” and do not spell out an exemption for cottage food operations, certified farmers market vendors, or very small producers. The chaptered text on the Legislature’s own site could not be retrieved at the time of writing, so no exemption is reported here either way. Anyone selling jarred product should read the statute or ask their county environmental health department rather than assume.
In committee the bill was framed as aligning the 1925 law with the federal Food Safety Modernization Act and cutting duplicative compliance, and it drew industry support. It was one of several agriculture measures signed the same day, alongside the $19.75 farmworker wage floor and a change to Williamson Act cancellation fees for farmland going to solar. Licensing is one of the few places where a food claim can actually be checked, a point worked through in what California’s raw milk permit tells you. The people who make these products are listed in our Producers directory.
Why this matters for SoCal: Small-label salsas, pickles and hot sauces are a fixture of the region’s farmers markets, and the registration, validated-process and fee requirements behind those jars changed on Sept. 30.
Update, Oct. 20, 2026: Licensing is only as strong as its enforcement. A Riverside County case closed weeks later with no penalty at all, after the state helped an unlicensed raw goat milk seller re-register her product as pet food.
Sources: AB 2706 bill record, CalMatters Digital Democracy · AB 2706 history and votes, LegiScan · Governor Newsom issues legislative update 9.30.2026