This week, President Donald Trump signed a series of executive orders aimed at cracking down on immigration. These orders will likely have ripple effects on both authorized and unauthorized migrants in this country. One sector that reforms will likely impact is agriculture, which relies heavily on immigrant labor.
To get a glimpse of what Trump’s immigration policy could mean for farmers, we called Patrick Smith, CEO of Loftus Ranches, an apple and hops farm in Yakima, Washington, that depends of work of H-2A visa holders. “Marketplace” host Kai Ryssdal spoke with Smith about the future.
The following is an edited transcript of their conversation.
Kai Ryssdal: First of all, I guess. How is business at Loftus Ranches?
Patrick Smith: Business is good. You know, agriculture, of course, is very cyclical, and hops and apples, our two main crops, are currently in a slightly recessionary cycle. But you know, we have a great team here and we focus on the things we can control. And yes, we are making progress.
Ryssdal: Fair enough. Let’s talk about some things you may not be able to control. Here is my question. First of all, what is your professional situation at the moment? Are you getting all the H-2 visas you need and, incidentally, how much does it cost? It must be really expensive.
Black-smith: Yes, so we are fortunate that the H-2 visa program gives us the availability of the workforce that we need to get the job done. As you mentioned, the difficulty is that costs, you know, continue to rise even faster than inflation, which is a significant real increase in costs.
Ryssdal: What I hear you saying is that your margins are getting really thin.
Black-smith: Yeah, that’s right. So the Northwest Horticultural Council trade group recently commissioned a study of labor costs for Washington state apple growers over the past decade. And in 2023, Washington state apple growers spent 99% of their income on labor, so that 1% doesn’t leave much for fertilizer, taxes, water and fuel for your tractors, things like that. And so yes, the margins are reduced. In comparison, in 2013, labor represented around 37% of the income per cell that apple growers received.
Ryssdal: You don’t need me to tell you this, but having 1% left is no way to run a business model.
Black-smith: No, and as we said before, farmers are price takers. We don’t set the price of apples, and in an economic and political environment where inflation really drives elections and, you know, household budgets, it’s really difficult for us to manage, and, you know, not to adopt on the significant cost increases that consumers would see at the grocery store.
Ryssdal: It’s hard to know what the new Trump administration is going to do on immigration until it does it, but they have launched crackdowns, and obviously the crackdowns won’t affect H-2A workers because they are legally sponsored by you. But it’s possible that this administration will decide that even legal immigration isn’t something it cares about.
Black-smith: Yeah, absolutely. You know, farm labor and a secure source of farm labor are more than just important to employers like us. Food security is an important element, as you know, of national security. This is also an important trade negotiating point as US agriculture is a net exporter, and if legal immigration is limited by Trump administration policies, this has further implications for the beyond just how it affects farmers.
Ryssdal: I know I ask you this almost every time, and I never remember. You are the fourth generation of your family to live on this farm, correct?
Black-smith: Yeah, that’s right.
Ryssdal: All right. And you, your siblings and the rest of your family have grown. Now you have a brewery, you have Loftus Labs, which is sort of an analytics and data company. So you are clearly expanding. How old are your children now, Patrick?
Black-smith: I have three children. They are 14, 8 and 4 years old.
Ryssdal: Fourteen years old, so not far from deciding what this child is going to do. Do you imagine that they will be generation number 5 on the farm?
Black-smith: I certainly hope so. If we do our job well, we hope the farm will be there so they can at least decide whether they want to come back or not. You know, I certainly hope that we pursue smart immigration and trade policies that benefit farmers as well as the nation as a whole.
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