International Fresh Produce Association (IFPA) is the largest and most diverse association servicing the entire fresh produce supply chain, advocating for its members and the industry to create beneficial changes. Farm Reporter Maci Carter had the opportunity to speak with Rebeckah Adcock, the organization’s vice president of U.S. government relations.
The team at IFPA has been working towards workforce labor and immigration reform for decades. “We’ve warned Congress and the federal government that if you don’t do something, we’ll get to critical mass, and we definitely are,” Adcock stated. “it is the number one limiting factor for the ongoing operations for specialty crops is whether or not they have enough people to plant, harvest, and process their products.”
She expressed gratitude for the discussions around the H-2A program as a step in the right direction and to bring some “sanity” to how wages are calculated. Additionally, IFPA seeks reforms to the employer obligations to employees and to make the process of obtaining H-2A workers less cumbersome.
She referred to President Trump’s acknowledgement that there are some undocumented workers in agriculture who are otherwise following the law, and his intent to examine options for dealing with those individuals.
“Things are very early in that space, but we appreciate that acknowledgement from the President,” Adcock said.
She admitted to uncertainty during the early days of the Trump administration surrounding rumors of his immigration policies and also sympathized with his concerns for the nation’s security. She also knew that there were undocumented workers in the agricultural community with reasons that they couldn’t go through the normal process of documentation.
“We were worried about whether they would come for those people and what would be the fill-in,” she said. “We’re at record unemployment for U.S. workers, and most of them aren’t excited to work on farms at almost any price we have learned. So, how would we make up for that gap when we need even more people?”
She is pleasantly surprised to see that President Trump has focused more on aliens with criminal records and ties. She also believes that he is trying to find a path to allow workers who contribute to the workforce where there are gaps to continue to do so in a law-abiding manner.
Turning the conversation to trade, Adcock pointed out that fresh produce trade is global and that the team at IFPA is very concerned about the uncertainty surrounding tariffs. “For American growers, we are certainly seeing problems with whether or not Canada is continuing to pick up contracts, a decrease there,” she said. “I think things have smoothed out a little bit with Mexico because the USMCA is still in place.”
Pineapples, bananas, and other tropical produce are not grown in the U.S. on a large enough scale to supply the demand for them; therefore, when supply is restricted by trade barriers, prices increase for American families.
“The good news is that the administration has been very receptive in listening, and they are asking us to share what we are seeing because I think they do care, and they don’t want to see prices skyrocket,” Adcock observed. “They want time to negotiate and get a better deal. That is admirable, so we are just going to wait and see.”
As far as reconciliation, Adcock and her team are seeking better risk management tools for producers, as a large number of agricultural products lack any insurance options at all.
“We have a lot of ideas about changes, there, and not all of them will fit in reconciliation, but we do have a very strong ask, especially for our Crop Research Initiative and things that focus on Mechanization Automation – things that help the labor pressures that we have,” Adcock detailed.
She added, “We are very focused on making sure that our state block grant program gets funded. We have a huge concern about making sure USDA’s presence in the crop protection, pest management, and pest abatement space stays in place. Our list goes on and on. We have over a hundred recommendations in total for our whole sector, but those are just samples of some of the bigger ticket items.”
For more information about the International Fresh Produce Association, visit freshproduce.com.
