Farmers head south as crackdown bites
01 October 2007 10:27
Maura Maxwell
The wider availability of imported fruits and vegetables has played an important role in pushing up consumption levels in the US. According to a recent USDA report, annual US imports of fresh fruit and vegetables surged from US$2.7bn to US$7.9bn between 1990-92 and 2004-06. During the same period, fruit consumption rose from 88.7 lbs to 101.2 lbs, while vegetable consumption climbed to 173.5lbs from 123.2lbs.
A major part of this rise has come from the growing popularity of exotic fruits like mangoes, pineapples and papayas, whose market share has doubled in just over a decade. By and large, fruit imports supplement, rather than replace American production, either because they are products not grown locally or because imports are limited to times of the year when there is no domestic production.
The rise in sales of imported vegetables – most of which hail from Mexico and Canada – has also come in response to consumer demand for year-round supplies. But recently, US farmers have started moving their operations out of the country for altogether different reasons. A government crackdown on illegal immigrants has left many large-scale vegetable farmers scrambling to find enough workers to harvest their crops and an increasing number of them are shifting production south of the border into Mexico, where labor is in cheap and plentiful supply.
While it is difficult to obtain precise figures on the extent of American farming interests in Mexico, one US senator, Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, claims to know of more than 46,000 acres that American growers are cultivating in just two Mexican states, Guanajuato and Baja California.
The effects of the clampdown on migrant workers are already starting to be felt in America’s agricultural heartland, where fears are mounting that many working in agriculture and supporting industries could lose their jobs if the exodus continues.
The erosion of national borders is part and parcel of today’s increasingly globalized food industry as producers chase cheaper sources of production. By moving to plug the tide of migrant workers from Central and South America, the US is simply speeding up the process.
And one man’s loss is another man’s gain. Foreign investors are pouring huge amounts of capital into the construction of state-of-the-art farms in Mexico whose output is trucked north of the border to satisfy the growing appetite for healthy food. The farmer is happy, the consumer is happy.
The wider availability of imported fruits and vegetables has played an important role in pushing up consumption levels in the US. According to a recent USDA report, annual US imports of fresh fruit and vegetables surged from US$2.7bn to US$7.9bn between 1990-92 and 2004-06. During the same period, fruit consumption rose from 88.7 lbs to 101.2 lbs, while vegetable consumption climbed to 173.5lbs from 123.2lbs.
A major part of this rise has come from the growing popularity of exotic fruits like mangoes, pineapples and papayas, whose market share has doubled in just over a decade. By and large, fruit imports supplement, rather than replace American production, either because they are products not grown locally or because imports are limited to times of the year when there is no domestic production.
The rise in sales of imported vegetables – most of which hail from Mexico and Canada – has also come in response to consumer demand for year-round supplies. But recently, US farmers have started moving their operations out of the country for altogether different reasons. A government crackdown on illegal immigrants has left many large-scale vegetable farmers scrambling to find enough workers to harvest their crops and an increasing number of them are shifting production south of the border into Mexico, where labor is in cheap and plentiful supply.
While it is difficult to obtain precise figures on the extent of American farming interests in Mexico, one US senator, Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, claims to know of more than 46,000 acres that American growers are cultivating in just two Mexican states, Guanajuato and Baja California.
The effects of the clampdown on migrant workers are already starting to be felt in America’s agricultural heartland, where fears are mounting that many working in agriculture and supporting industries could lose their jobs if the exodus continues.
The erosion of national borders is part and parcel of today’s increasingly globalized food industry as producers chase cheaper sources of production. By moving to plug the tide of migrant workers from Central and South America, the US is simply speeding up the process.
And one man’s loss is another man’s gain. Foreign investors are pouring huge amounts of capital into the construction of state-of-the-art farms in Mexico whose output is trucked north of the border to satisfy the growing appetite for healthy food. The farmer is happy, the consumer is happy.
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