Workforce Wanted

Immigration reform is a contentious, often emotional topic for many Americans. But for American agriculture, it's mainly a labor issue.

The idea that grown children will return to their home farms and provide all the needed labor is a wonderful ideal, but "we're having a hard enough time getting kids to come back and run the farm," says Krisiti Boswell, director of congressional relations for the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF). "And besides, that's a management role."

As Boswell travels around the U.S. talking with growers about immigration reform, she has been struck by how universal the need is. While the public associates immigrant farm workers with picking fruits or vegetables, they are just as likely to work on dairies or drive custom harvesters.

Hard numbers are difficult to come by, but most agricultural groups estimate 70 percent of farm workers are unauthorized. Boswell draws a difference between unauthorized and undocumented, as the government requires all employers to check documents for new hires; farm audits, however, find much of that paperwork is fraudulent.

Nationwide Reform

While it's easy for growers with highly mechanized systems to think immigration reform won't impact their operations, there are plenty of examples that suggest all of agriculture is suffering from a broken immigration system.

In California, for instance, Boswell says, many fruit and vegetable growers who can't get workers are switching to less labor-intensive row crops. As a result of labor shortages, farmers no longer grow more than 80,000 acres of fresh produce. Instead, that production has moved to other countries.

The issue is also impacting the feed market. Dairies and other livestock operators who can't hire workers are no longer in the market for feedstuffs or are dumping feed formerly used to maintain their livestock onto the market. A 2012 Texas A&M study found that dairy farms using migrant labor supply more than three-fifths of the milk in the country. Without these employees, the study predicts economic output would decline by $22 billion and 133,000 workers would lose their jobs.

Each farm worker, whether native-born or immigrant, supports between two and three full-time jobs in food processing, transportation, farm equipment and marketing retail. The loss of a substantial number of farm workers could ripple through the entire ag-based economy with potentially long-term negative effects.

Two-Pronged Approach

For immigration reform to work for American agriculture, most believe it must take two approaches.

First, protect current workers. Farms are already employing experienced workers they want to keep. AFBF is among the groups advocating for an earned adjustment of status to allow those experienced immigrant workers to remain. That change would likely include an incentive for the workers to keep working in agriculture for a pre-determined period. This is not necessarily a pathway to citizenship.

Second, the government must reinvent the agricultural guest worker program. "To work for agriculture, the guest worker program must be a cost-effective, market-based system," Boswell says. Currently, the guest worker program supplies just 4 percent of the needed agricultural workforce. Without a legal way for workers to enter the country, many cross the border illegally to fill the open jobs.

The Farm Bureau would like to see administration of the guest worker program moved from the U.S. Department of Labor to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which is more sympathetic to the perishable nature of agricultural produce. Ideally, the program should include both seasonal and year-round components. Other needed changes include issuing visas, good for up to three years, that allow workers to work at one farm or migrate between farms.

Reform Is Needed

"At the end of the day, farmers want a legal, affordable, reliable workforce," says Ryan Findlay, industry relations lead for Syngenta. "The process needs to be simple. It can't be 30 pages of paper that a lawyer checks out and is filed with five different agencies."

Syngenta is joining with other agricultural retailers and organizations to support comprehensive immigration reform.

"The quicker the better," Findlay says. "Agriculture needs this now."

Boswell can't agree more. "Congress must act. We are at the point where we will import labor or food," she says, pointing to a study done by AFBF that showed only enforcing the borders, without immigration reform, will cost $30 to $60 billion in agricultural production and increase food prices by 5 to 6 percent.

She encourages all ag professionals to call their legislators and ask for immigration reform. "Allowing legislators to ignore it because of political pressure is not acceptable," she says. "We need to make immigration laws work the way they were intended. Doing nothing or just enforcement is not an option for agriculture any longer."