The agricultural industry in the United States is facing a significant labor shortage, a crisis that demands immediate attention and a shift in how it’s discussed. Sarah Black, General Manager of Great Lakes Ag Labor and representing the Michigan Farm Bureau, recently spoke with Farm Director KC Sheperd, shedding light on the critical need for agricultural workforce reform.
Black stated that the agricultural workforce has needed reform for a long time, emphasizing the urgency of the situation. The growing reliance on guest workers underscores this need. “We talked about the need for us as an industry in agriculture to talk about our guest worker, our agricultural Labor Workforce, rather than talking about the issue as labor and immigration.”
Black stressed the importance of distinguishing between the agricultural labor crisis and the broader issue of immigration. “We have a crisis today on farms with not enough labor. There’s as much as a 20% shortage of farm labor across the country, and we have a legal, temporary guest worker program called H-2A that can and is helping fulfill that shortage, but it’s badly in need of reforms that haven’t been touched since 1986.”
A key point Black highlighted is the legal status of these workers, reminding everyone that these are not migrant workers. “These are legal, temporary guest workers who are part of our farm employment team. They’re here for the long run. They’re going to be part of our food production system going forward, and they’re legal, they’re temporary, they’re guest workers, they’re not migrants, they’re not illegal. So we shouldn’t be talking about our ag workforce in the same sentences that Congress wants to talk about immigration reform or deportations, that’s a completely different topic.”
When discussing potential solutions, Black pointed to the current wage structure as a primary area for reform. “The biggest cost that’s impacting farms today is labor. It’s the largest growing sector of a lot of our farms, their labor costs are as much as 40% of their annual operating costs.”
She specifically addressed the adverse effect wage rate (AEWR) associated with the H-2A program. “And if a farmer is using one of the guest worker programs like H-2A, the number one cost driver is what’s called the adverse effect wage rate, or the AEWR. Congress could fix that today. What they need to do is just pause it, because we need to figure out a different mechanism for finding a wage that’s more connected to the marketplace, that doesn’t place regional states against each other. The process that’s used today is old. It’s antiquated, and it doesn’t work, and it’s provided so much instability for farmers. They can’t plan; they don’t know what their labor costs are going to be for the next year. So that’s the number one thing they could do today is pause the AEWR. Let’s get some smart people in a room and figure out what a replacement wage structure would look like, because the ag industry cannot survive without these workers.”
Black underscored the vital role these guest workers play in the nation’s food security. “They are going to be part of our food production system going forward. Everybody recognizes that they’re great people. They’re part of our farm teams. We need them. We need them if we want to continue to grow food here in our country, on our own soil, under our own environmental and labor laws, versus being dependent upon another country to import it in. In 2023, the United States became a net importer of food for the first time in our country’s history. If that doesn’t make people wake up and sit back in their chairs, I don’t know what does. We need these workers. We need these legal guest workers to continue to help grow food here in the US.”
The relationship between farmers and these guest workers is often long-standing and mutually beneficial. “They’re amazing people. We have a lot of multi-generational family farms that have been using this program now for 10-12 years, and they get 100% of the same people back every year. They’re part of their family. They’re amazing people, and are so respectful and so appreciative of the opportunity. It really is a win-win. We just have to fix some of these antiquated pieces of the program that no longer make sense.”
Black concluded with a clear call to action. “Let’s freeze the AEWR at the 2023 rate, and give us a little bit of time as an industry to wrap our heads around what a replacement fair, predictable wage structure would look like going forward.” Her insights highlight the urgent need for Congress and the agricultural industry to collaborate on reforms that ensure a stable and legal workforce for American farms.
