Agriculture is North Carolina’s No. 1 industry and relies heavily on H-2A visa workers, who are foreign temporary agricultural workers. The John Locke Foundation has proposed a working group to examine the guest worker visa program and identify areas for improvement.
H2A workers place a significant burden on small to mid-sized farmers, who must shoulder the costs of housing and transporting guest workers, in addition to paying their wages, according to “Harvest on Hold,” a report out earlier this year by Kelly Lester, policy analyst for the John Locke Foundation.
“As the availability of farm labor has declined, wages have increased in response to the dynamics of supply and demand, while some argue this is a natural market correction, others point out that wage increases in agriculture often do not translate to long-term solutions,” said the report. “Many small and mid-sized farms operate on tight margins and cannot easily absorb high labor costs without raising prices or reducing their workforce.”
The proposed working group would consist of 13 members, including representatives from the US Department of Agriculture, Department of Commerce, and Department of Labor; representatives from the Farm Bureau and Growers Association; state lawmakers and owners of small to mid-sized farms; labor contractors, academics, and nonprofit reps serving immigrant and seasonal workers.
“The H-2A visa program is critical to North Carolina agriculture, but it’s overly complicated, expensive, and slow to adapt to modern farm realities,” Lester, who authored the proposal, told the Carolina Journal. “Right now, farmers face layers of bureaucracy that drive up costs and make it harder to bring in workers when they’re actually needed. While the federal government has started discussing some reforms to the program, it is vital for North Carolina to have a voice. By creating a working group focused on real-world reforms — like streamlining applications, cutting compliance delays, and making the program more flexible for year-round operations — we can help farmers lower their input costs in a time when it is desperately expensive to operate a farm.”
The purpose of the working group would be to examine how the program currently operates within North Carolina, identify areas for improvement, and determine the best practices being implemented in neighboring states. Based on these examinations, the group would develop recommendations for policymakers at the federal level, including streamlining the application process, adjusting housing and wage requirements, and increasing flexibility for farms that need laborers on a year-round basis.
“The Working Group shall submit an interim report of its findings and recommendations to the Joint Legislative Oversight Committee on Agriculture and Natural and Economic Resources…” reads the draft legislation “…and submit a final report to the same committee and to the Governor…”
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