US Apple Calls for Legal Workforce
US Apple Calls for Legal Workforce. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Fruit Grower Report.
Last week US Apple Chairman Dale Foreman strongly urged Congress to find a solution to the agricultural labor challenges currently facing apple growers throughout the United States.
FOREMAN: We need a legal, stable, reliable force to pick our fruit and we would like some kind of reform to the ag labor situation that allows people from south of the border to come into this country legally and work in the fruit orchards and in the packing sheds and get the job done. It’s a terrible situation if you have good quality fruit rotting on the ground or hanging on the tree unpicked.
Foreman says this is something that can be fixed but he says there needs to be the will in Congress to solve the problem. But why not just hire American workers.
FOREMAN: We tried to hire Americans. We would offer a job to anybody who could come and pick and last year we were so short that we ran radio ads throughout north central Washington offering $150 per day for people to come and pick our apples. We needed over 100 pickers at our orchards and we got 3 pickers to show up because of the radio ads. There simply are not enough normal Americans who are willing to work hard and pick apples.
More on Monday.
That’s today’s Fruit Grower Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.
