Immigration reform in the 2023 Farm Bill is a primary focus for the National Council of Farm Cooperatives, which declares labor the No. 1 issue for its members and the nation among food shortage scares.
“American agriculture cannot increase production much, without a change in the labor situation,” says NCFB President Chuck Connor. “We are in need of labor both at the co-op level and at the farmer level.”
Connor says immigration reform is an issue with Congress because that labor will have to be foreign, and that can’t happen without changes in the law.
“The good news is Congress knows what those changes are — we’ve been advocating this for years — they just haven’t had the willpower to do it,” he says.
This next Farm Bill will be Connor’s ninth. In his conversation with Mid-West Farm Report posted above, he also outlines climate-smart agriculture, operating costs for cooperatives, and the farm credit situation.
Connor says without more labor, the international food crisis will only get worse. National outlets have reported “food shortages are next global health crisis,” “the baby formula shortage is a preview of a coming food crisis,” and “food shortages could be ‘just as deadly’ as global pandemic.” Connor says these headlines make him nervous.
He says many commodities were already coming off short supply before the Russia-Ukraine War due to high demand. Now that the war is ongoing in Eastern Europe, buyers are turning to the United States, driving up costs and limiting supply.
“I always thought people said ‘we’re going to be fed well in the United States no matter what the circumstances is’ but now I’m beginning to wonder… it makes me nervous,” he says, stressing the need for a larger workforce to meet increased global demand.
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack sees the bipartisan Farm Workforce Modernization Act as the solution. He says he’s confident the bill would get passed if there was political courage to do so. He says policymakers in D.C. not only know that labor shortages are a significant problem in agriculture, but they also have the solution to solve the workforce crisis in front of them.
“The industry and labor came together and said: ‘Here’s the solution. You don’t have to compromise. You don’t have to think about this. You don’t have to worry about whether your business is upset or the labor guys are upset. We’re all very happy with this. Here it is — all you have to do is say yes.’ And they can’t get 60 people to say yes in the Senate,” Vilsack says. “Now why is that? We don’t have 60 votes because folks want to use this to politically divide us.”
Learn more about the workforce bill: https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/1603