09/20/07 Immigration Issues Part 2

Immigration Issues Part 2. I'm Greg Martin with today's Line On Agriculture. The Dairy Farmers of America have been working with a number of other agencies to try and get something moving on the immigration front. Like many industries, dairy farming has been hurt by the lack of workers and the lack of a strong immigration package to bring those workers to the U.S. To listen to a lot of talk show hosts and the scuttlebutt around the pickle barrel, the answer is easy - give those jobs to Americans. Trevor Blackann is the Vice President of Governmental Affairs with DFA and he says that while that is a good theory, there are some problems with it. BLACKANN: The problem right now is unemployment rates  it's a great thing for our country, but unemployment rates in many areas are down. H2A visas for example only supply 1.9% of the workforce in America. Now remember that H2A is a temporary visa and if they're only supplying 1.9% of the work, yet still enough that it has a dramatic impact on agriculture, you can see that many of those jobs just aren't being filled. A big part of the employment issue is the skill required to do the job. BLACKANN: The pay isn't the issue. In the case of DFA farmers that we have been talking to, we have an internal group that's been put together to advise us at the staff level, an internal group of farmers, how to handle different immigration issues. They are all telling us they are paying well above minimum wage; in fact 3 & 4 times above minimum wage in many cases. The issue isn't the money; it's the ability to do the work and in the case of dairy it's not a job that just anybody can come off the street and do. It's an acquired skill, it's a learned skill that requires training. It's much the same as it is in other agriculture industries; the people just aren't there no matter how much you advertise the positions. Blackann says the answer is with Congress. BLACKANN: Well the answer is with Congress. The mood in Congress has got to change. It only takes one giant episode in the dairy industry. It's not like switching from corn to soybeans where the ethanol mandates drive up the price of corn you can plant corn one season and the next season if soybean prices are good you have the availability to plant soybeans  it doesn't work that way in dairy. And of course we all know what dairy prices are doing right now and according to Blackann, that could just be the beginning. BLACKANN: Hopefully it doesn't come to the point where dairy prices  so many farmers go out of business as the prices go through the roof. For example in Hawaii where I think there is currently one dairy farm, a gallon of milk is over $9 dollars. If we see that in the lower 48 we are in big, big trouble. Congress has got to step in  do something to allow us an opportunity to have employees working on the farm and keeping those cows milked. That's today's Line On Agriculture. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.