12/17/07 Labor and water major challenges to future of fruit industry

Washington Ag December 17, 2007 Just how important are the issues of labor and water to Washington's fruit industry? O'Rourke: "They could determine if the industry stays in the state of Washington or not. Those two, and what happens to them." That is Desmond O'Rourke, retired Washington State University economist who was one of the speakers at the recent WSU Outlook Conference. How soon will the showdown come over labor and water? O'Rourke: "If we had a couple more years of drought the showdown could come pretty soon. The labor one, most people are just sitting on the edge of their chairs wondering if and when Congress will act, and if they don't act before a new president what the new president's stance will be. And that could make a tremendous change to the availability of labor in the Pacific Northwest." O'Rourke said the past two years have probably been among the best the state's fruit industry has had in the past 50 years after what was one of the worst decades in recent years from 1995-2005. He says a point made at the Outlook Conference was the need to go for the high quality premium market and that means you have to deliver high quality premium fruit to that market. I'm Bob Hoff.