Semillero de Ideas recently launched the first-of-its-kind consultant program with the Washington State Tree Fruit Association in which trained farmworker consultants can work directly with the state’s tree fruit growers.
Erik Nicholson, executive director of Semillero de Ideas — an organization that trains farmworkers as consultants to help in process improvement, safety and efficiency — says this program is a recognition of the wealth of knowledge farmworkers bring, both from working in the fields and from working in farming families.
“When one talks to workers and creates a safe space, you learn just the amazing insights they have about what could or should be happening that could both enhance the dignity of work and support growers to be more productive, more efficient, safer and have higher food safety protocols,” Nicholson says. “Unfortunately, the culture of our industry has been such that it is rarely, if ever, brought into the productive process, recognized and rewarded.”
This partnership will dispatch workers to help provide ground-level knowledge. The Equitable Food Initiative developed and led a multiweek training that the farmworker consultants successfully completed.
Genaro Pavel Garcia and Josue Damian Granados are two of the first consultants to be a part of this program.
A Manufacturing Model for the Orchard
Jon DeVaney, president of the Washington State Tree Fruit Association, says this is like in other industries where consultants can offer advice on process improvements, development of tools or other internal changes.
“With such a highly mobile workforce, some farms might be reluctant to try to bring a whole crew in to have that conversation,” he says, highlighting the value of having experienced farmworkers who know how to do harvest work or other functions provide input on process improvements.
Nicholson says the program does not seek to displace or replace the consultants working in the industry but rather to bring a different perspective.
“From my perspective, the most knowledgeable people in our industry are those actually doing work,” he says.
Nicholson says many of the processes used in agriculture today haven’t changed that much, and these consultants offer a real opportunity to create true improvements.
“In other industries, we talk about a culture of continuous improvement and someone that creates more value needs to be paid for it, and farmworkers are just as capitalistic as everybody else,” he says. “I think that’s kind of the opportunity we have. How do we invest more in the workforce? We have to create more value for everybody.”
Investing in Human Capital
Nicholson says the consultant program also provides a true career ladder, which has been lacking in the horticulture industry.
“Every worker who works in specialty ag has some trick up their sleeve about how to do things better, faster,” he says. “The challenge and the opportunity are: How do we invite folks to share that, how do we compensate them for that and how do we recognize and reward them for that?”
Nicholson says this is also an opportunity to create small changes with big impacts in the industry through productivity and efficiency. He adds that while organizational design literature promotes the idea of investing in the workforce to get desired results, the agriculture industry often falls short.
“Imagine if we apply that same logic to horticulture,” he says. “‘We’re going to invest as little as possible in the field. We’re going to cut back in fertilizer. We’re going to irrigate as little as possible. We’re not going to go high-density. We’re going to do this as cheaply as possible.’ It’s a necessary proposition, but that’s exactly what we’re doing with labor.”
Precision Approach to Productivity
DeVaney says this is a new model for the horticulture industry, though he sees the potential for these consultants.
“It’s just not something that every farm has done in the past,” he says. “It is something that’s been more common in the manufacturing and corporate environment. I think this is a longer-term project, but it’s one I think that provides a lot of good opportunities to recognize the expertise of some of these workers.”
Growers have been open to the idea, DeVaney says, though it’s not necessarily something they will seek out immediately and will likely use as a resource as problems arise throughout the growing season.
“Most people in agriculture don’t go looking for money to spend,” he says. “They address problems as they come up and as he feels necessary to do so. So, I suspect that what will happen is people will take on board the fact that this opportunity exists and will be thinking about it, and as they note problems or something that has been a longtime irritant, they’ll say, ‘Maybe that’s something I could have go through this process and see if I can get it fixed.’”
But DeVaney says the consultant program offered through Semillero de Ideas is more indicative of the current and future of the fresh produce industry, where efficiency becomes increasingly important.
“It is also representative of the transition going on in the industry, where ongoing labor shortages have more and more growers thinking in terms of productivity per worker and efficiency and how to maximize the effectiveness of your individual workforce, because adding more people becomes just physically more difficult and more costly over time,” he says. “So, the shift toward maximizing productivity through having technological assists or having process improvements — that focus is one that will take time to fully implement, but it shows that the industry does continue, as a whole, to innovate in response to pressures.”
