As part of House Agriculture Committee Chairman Glenn “GT” Thompson’s draft of the Securing Agriculture’s Workforce Act, the legislation paves the way for the mushroom and controlled environment agriculture industries to participate in the H-2A temporary guestworker program. A provision in the bill redefines “temporary” labor by allowing any contract under 350 days to qualify for the H-2A program, regardless of whether the underlying job is technically year-round.
The Breaking Point of Existing Workforces
Rachel Roberts, president of the American Mushroom Institute, says currently mushroom growers in the U.S. utilize workers who are descendants of the original Bracero Program participants, who arrived in the U.S. legally from Mexico, had families and those members grew up and became a part of the mushroom industry.
“I like to say we’re not just growing mushrooms; we’re growing communities because we are this year-round opportunity for stable employment,” she says.
She says that interest in remaining in the mushroom industry is changing. Growers look in existing communities and hope people from those families enter into the industry, but interest is dwindling and the existing workforce is aging out.
“We did a survey that was in 2019 of all of our growers and their HR departments and we asked them how many applicants who are American-born and citizens do you get?” she says. “The response was zero. So, it’s not just that it’s maybe a job that people don’t know about. It’s a job that clearly has become a niche for this community and for agriculture in general.”
Roberts says American mushroom growers have maximized efficiencies to the point where it’s no longer possible to extend further.
“We’re operating at this frustrating level where we just can’t stretch anybody anymore,” she says of the current workforce. “We’ve stretched everybody and they’re sticking in it and they’re working for this industry. But that stretch is gone.”
Tom Stenzel, executive director of the Controlled Environment Agriculture Alliance, echoes this sentiment, saying much like field-grown produce, “we simply can’t find enough domestic workers.” While controlled environment agriculture growers have added technology to assist with production, “indoor produce growers still need a reliable workforce.”
Stenzel says that as indoor production continues to expand, growers face the 10-month seasonal limitation, which he says, “simply doesn’t work for year-round growers.”
The Economic Stakes of the Tipping Point
Roberts says for mushrooms, the challenge is the need for new workers to enter the industry. And without that, the consequences could be dire.
“We’ve had 12 farms go out of business in the past three years,” she says.
Roberts says mushroom growing truly is a 365-day-a-year operation with daily watering, turning compost and more. And yes, she says automation is an option for operations with the right infrastructure. And operations also need to invest in new infrastructure to take advantage of innovations. But ultimately, the industry needs workers to help fuel more efficiencies so operations can make those updates and investments.
“We’re so close to the tipping point and that’s the workforce we need and because we don’t have it, we can’t make investments and some of the other pieces that would sustain our industry into the future or ultimately reduce costs at a time when demand is down,” she says.
Stenzel says while greenhouse-grown tomatoes dominate U.S. sales, he estimates indoor-grown greens represent about 8% of bagged salad sales in the U.S. and indoor-grown strawberries continue to grow.
“Indoor-grown produce is an increasing part of the U.S. produce supply, but H-2A limitations are actually reducing the ability of growers to invest in the U.S. as compared to Canada or Mexico,” he says.
Stenzel says that while the H-2A guestworker program has costs and needs process improvements, he sees access to a secure labor pool as an important step to the future.
“We will be thrilled when Congress approves a transition to a year-round H-2A program,” Stenzel says. “Yes, there are costs and inefficiencies, but access to that labor pool is critical for our sector.”
Stenzel says the CEA industry continues to educate Congress and USDA on the vital role the industry plays in the fresh produce supply chain. He says while it’s a learning curve, the industry understands it’s a critical role in U.S. specialty crop production.
Stenzel says he doesn’t want to envision a future without agriculture labor reform. He says it’s time for Congress to create a fair labor program for all of U.S. agriculture, including indoor growers, saying, “It’s simply a case of putting American agriculture first.”
“Without adequate labor, the U.S. is simply outsourcing production to other countries,” Stenzel says. “Today, Canada supports one the one of the fastest-growing indoor farming sectors in the world. Why should the U.S. forgo that future?”
Infrastructure, Housing, and Wage Realities
John Hollay, president and CEO of the National Council of Agricultural Employers, says the draft sets the stage for different wage structures for year-round production instead of looking to existing structures.
“One of the really important things that GT [Thompson’s] bill does is that it takes the major five categories that are there, at least those in place, but it allows for the creation of new categories going forward so that you can actually build a wage structure that makes sense for these new industries that are coming in and not just try to pigeonhole them into existing structures,” he says.
Roberts says she worked with former NCAE president Michael Marsh to look at the Adverse Effect Wage Rates in the 38 states with large commercial mushroom production to track what it would look like if the industry had full access. She says, “It looks very expensive.”
While Hollay identifies housing regulations as a potential hurdle some growers will have to prepare for, Roberts notes the mushroom industry has a unique advantage. The U.S. mushroom industry has already invested in affordable housing for its existing workers for decades and decades.
“[Growers] are not afraid of that,” she says of the housing provisions. “They would welcome it. We need a new pipeline where our current pipeline is … aging out.”
Another piece Hollay identifies is also some sort of on-ramp for undocumented workers in the U.S. He says that could add additional challenges as there are family provisions in the H-2A program for H-4 visas, but it may not be a practical application.
“The reality of the industries and what they’re facing is forcing them to take this leap of faith that this is going to be better than our current situation and we can work with this administration to make sure that it works for employers and for producers,” he says.
Can Federal Bureaucracy Handle the Transition?
Roberts says the American Mushroom Institute estimates only about 700 to 800 workers in total would be needed to provide the mushroom industry with relief.
Hollay says there is concern about bringing in additional volume of applications into the existing framework of federal agencies.
“If there’s some kind of administrative action, they have to act on that because we’ve already asked them to act on the problems that current users have been facing and that is currently eroding the $17 billion in savings that we were supposed to achieve because the program isn’t working as intended,” he says.
But he says there are bright spots, with the Department of Labor creating a specific office to look at the challenges facing ag labor visas.
“We are urging the other departments to set up similar offices,” he says. “I know that there are efforts in the appropriation cycle in the community report language to our Department of Homeland Security and State to set up those kinds of offices.”
He says the idea is that the bill passes and then the next step will be to make the investment to ensure the programs run smoothly.
“I think they’re very aware of the challenges that current users are facing, which is why they took these steps,” he says. “I’m hopeful that they are preparing if they need to.”
Roberts shares in this concern, saying she hopes that capacity at federal agencies will be a focus with any expansion in the H-2A visa program. She says it’s worrisome that the cart could potentially come before the horse, but “we would 100% advocate for the government to consider capacity for expanding H-2A, expanding anything that creates year-round labor as an investment, as an investment in agriculture, in food security, in just doing the right thing for our consumers.”
She says as irony would have it, in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, as mushroom growers moved from seasonal production to year-round production to create an economic engine in the U.S., that change is what shut down the pipeline of workers. And while October to February might be peak season, being year-round does insulate the industry from weather variability.
Roberts says that access to year-round labor is a huge opportunity for rural communities and would directly benefit these communities.
“We bring the census numbers that create a basis to invest in rural economies,” she says. “We feel that our value is reflective of American values. We’re just creating businesses.”
