“Imagine going to bed at night and not knowing if you’re going to have enough people to help pick your crops.”
That’s how Bernie Thiel, a farmer from Lubbock, Texas, describes the challenge farmers face in finding enough labor to run their operations.
Farmers in the south typically use a lot of immigrant labor, but it’s become harder to find the help they need. This is why agriculture across the country is watching the nation’s immigration debate, and wondering if workers will be available in the future.
“Being in the business as long as I have, I’ve got people who’ve worked for me for 25 to 35 years,” Thiel said. “These are laborers who come from Mexico every year, and they’ve shown up for a long time. The problem is my labor force has gotten older and harder to come by now.
“There’s no new generation of laborers since the Reagan years, when we got amnesty in 1986. That’s where a lot of the hands I’m using now came from. I do get a few of my hired hands that have families and will come over and help.
“As far as finding help locally, it’s virtually impossible,” Thiel said. “I do advertise on the radio. I had it on two Mexican-American stations all summer long, from the start of the season to the end. When the season ended, I didn’t have one hand from those advertisements, and never kept a hand that did show up for more than two weeks.”
Other industries have begun to compete for immigrant labor, and it’s affecting farmers all over the country.
“In the last few years, we’ve had a demand for more laborers because of the oil industry,” Thiel said. “That has pulled some of my labor. Not a great deal of it, but my gosh, they start their workers at 18 to 20 dollars per hour.
“Reading through some of the different periodicals, it’s not just me. This is happening nationwide. I read an article about a strawberry farmer in California that plowed up 20 percent of his acreage. Keep in mind, it can cost up to $25,000 an acre to grow strawberries.”
Thiel said he knows the sickening feeling the farmer from California experienced.
“I’ve had to plow up squash for the last three years because I can’t find help,” Thiel said. “Of my normal plantings, I’ve had to plow up quite a bit because I couldn’t get it picked. This was marketable product that I already had a home for, but couldn’t get it harvested.”
Produce farmers aren’t the only ones feeling the pinch of a labor shortage. It’s hitting the dairy industry hard, too.
John Rosenow is a dairy farmer from Cochran, and he said the downturn for labor has gone on for several years.
“About 10 to 15 years ago, the local labor force dried up,” said Rosenow. “As a result, the Wisconsin dairy industry became stagnant. People were afraid to grow their operation because they couldn’t find any help.
“At that point, we discovered that Mexican immigrant labor was fantastic. They do an incredible job, work really hard and they’re reliable. Many operations began to hire Mexican labor and the industry began to grow again. Things improved, people started expanding, and the dairy industry improved in Wisconsin.”
As the nation’s immigration debate continues, the labor force is once again shrinking in Wisconsin, and dairy farmers are feeling the pinch.
“Generally, everyone is short one or two people,” Rosenow said. “It’s because the inflow of Mexican labor from the south has dried up quite a bit.
“A large part of the downturn stems from border security. It’s a lot harder for people to cross the southern border. The fact that it’s gotten so much harder gives people less hope that they can come be part of this economy and industry.”
The need for reliable farm labor is growing again.
“As far as people to milk the cows day in and day out, feed the calves, clean the barns and other chores like that, I have not found anyone worth hiring, other than immigrant laborers, over the last 10 to 15 years,” Rosenow said. “If society wants to have an abundant supply of safe, wholesome food, produced here in the United States, which helps keep America secure, we have to have labor to do it. That labor is going to have to come as immigrants.”
By Chad Smith, Midwest Producer
Source: Agri-View