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AG NETWORK
Five Minutes With Dan
Even as a perfect storm of supply and demand dynamics has bolstered
commodity prices – to record levels in some cases – agriculture remains
jeopardized by its Achilles heel: Ensuring a stable, legal work force of
sufficient size come harvest time.
A proposed solution to the seasonal needs of tens of thousands of farm
operations nationwide has been cobbled together at the federal level in
the form of a guest worker program run by the states in which farmers
are encourage to participate. By hiring foreign laborers who have
obtained work visas through the program, farmers can hire enough help
enough to harvest their crops, while the guest workers collect their
checks and head happily home – theoretically.
The truth is however, that practical and political issues, the same ones
that complicate the entire illegal immigration debate, are threatening
to undercut the program. If that happens, according to Dan Fazio, the
Washington Farm Bureau’s Director of Employment Services, it could hurt
the very rural communities whose residents supposedly need protection
from an onslaught of immigrant labor.
Chief among those complications is the November 2007 federal mandate
that states must verify the legal status of all farm workers referred by
state employment agencies.
“There is an undeniable shortage of field workers for farmers in our
state,” Fazio explained, “and farmers are trying to comply with the
rules and hire legal workers. But the state government here is not
making it any easier.”
The Washington Farm Bureau is the state’s largest agriculture
organization, with more than 35,000 member families. If labor shortages
aren’t addressed successfully, many of those family farms could be
negatively impacted, Fazio cautioned.
In a conversation with AgNetwork.com Contributing Editor Dan Murphy, he
outlined the dynamics of the problem and talked about potential
solutions to the larger farm labor crisis.
AgNetwork.com:
You referenced a shortage of willing field workers. How big is that
shortage? What kind of numbers are we talking about?
Fazio:
Right now, we estimate that the state’s farm harvest requires about
55,000 seasonal workers. With as aggressive an effort as possible, we
project that there will be about 45,000 workers available this season.
That leaves a potential shortfall or about 10,000 workers.
AgNetwork.com:
Actually, many of the ag-related jobs in Washington pay piecework, and
an experienced worker can earn decent money, correct? Why is there such
a significant shortage of people willing to work the harvest?
Fazio:
There is a variety of reasons. For starters, few people these days want
to be a seasonal worker – and not just Americans. With virtually full
employment, there are just too many other jobs that are 9 to 5,
year-round. Plus, for many immigrant workers, there are other options
now that pay more than agriculture. Agricultural jobs in this state pay
about $10 to $15 an hour. That may seem okay, but construction jobs are
going for $15 to $25 an hour. Why pick fruit when you can hang drywall
for twice as much money?
AgNetwork.com:
Has this shortage had an economic impact yet?
Fazio:
Absolutely. In 2005 alone, our state apple growers lost more than $100
million worth of Red Delicious apples because they couldn’t get
harvested on time. They simply fell to the ground and rotted.
AgNetwork.com:
Disasters such as that are no doubt part of the reason why there are
very vocal proponents of the guest workers program for farm workers. In
fact, the H-2A program (for agriculture) is actually more favorable for
immigrant workers than other options they might have, isn’t it?
Fazio:
Yes. For workers issued temporary visas under the H-2A program, farmers
participating in the program must pay for their transportation from the
border, provide free housing, transportation to the fields and pay a
minimum of $9.94 an hour. It’s a good deal for the workers.
AgNetwork.com:
Yet there are big problems with the way Washington state administers the
program. Talk about those problems.
Fazio:
Well, we’re out there encouraging as many farmers as possible to sign up
for the [guest workers] program, but it’s not easy. First of all, the
farmer has to prove that there are not enough local workers available.
So if he needs 50 workers, he must recruit local workers through the
state’s work force agency. Often, hundreds of job seekers – many of whom
have no interest in actually working – are sent to the farm. Usually,
only a handful actually shows up to work at harvest time, and they’re
likely to be undocumented.
But the farmer has to try to verify the immigration status of every
worker he’s referred, and only after screening all the referrals can he
apply for H2-A visas to bring in temporary guest workers.
AgNetwork.com:
Wait a second. The farmer has to check each applicant’s legal status?
Why? Doesn’t the federal government require the states to check the
legal status of workers referred through these programs?
Fazio:
Of course. Here in Washington, though, state officials simply announced
earlier this month that they did not have the resources to conduct
background checks. In essence, they told farmers they would have to
verify the status of the workers they hire. Look, we’re sympathetic to
the “unfunded mandates” argument, but we believe there is a different
reason why the state isn’t helping the H-2A program to succeed.
AgNetwork.com:
What’s that?
Fazio:
Well, to put it plainly, there are a lot of immigrant advocacy groups
that just don’t like the concept of a guest worker program. They think
it’s demeaning for the participants and ill-advised as immigration
policy. They have a lot of money and lots of leverage in state
government.
AgNetwork.com:
Is there any traction to be gained with an argument about the impact of
farm labor shortages on Washington’s economy?
Fazio:
Not really. Not with those groups. We’re working hard to enroll farmers
in the program, and we make sure that the guest workers understand that
if they are granted visas and then fail to work the harvest as promised,
they’re never going to get a chance to gain legal status in America
again. But when farmers, many of them one-man operations, have to fill
out paperwork 60 days ahead of time, then try to verify the
documentation of every workers the state sends them, it’s an intolerable
burden.
AgNetwork.com:
What are the prospects of getting the state to start doing the right
thing and verifying the status of guest-worker applicants as is supposed
to happen?
Fazio:
We’ve had meetings with the state attorney general and the governor’s
staff, and we’ve even had the presidential candidates when they were
here all saying all the right things about the need for a stable, legal
work force on the farm. But we’re a long ways from making the changes
that need to be made.
AgNetwork.com:
So farmers are few options other than to struggle through another season
hiring whomever they can to harvest the crops. That doesn’t seem right.
Fazio:
Well, for all the activists who complain about illegal workers – and it
is a problem, obviously – I
can share one fact with you. Right now, there are about 10,000 “working”
farms in Washington state, and I know of a grand total of exactly two
where the on-farm work force is totally legal.
That’s not right, either – but it’s not the farmer’s fault.
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