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-Summer 1996 "Update" Newsletter Article -
Five-year study focuses on farm workers
From CATI Publication #961001
Copyright © 1996. All rights reserved.
An extensive study of the complex world of farm labor in California has revealed few increases in the wages of seasonal farmworkers during recent years and a clear increase in growers' use of farm labor contractors to get their seasonal work done.
The five-year study, recently completed by a research team from California State University, Fresno, was designed to track changes in the dynamics of seasonal farm labor as a result of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA). The IRCA placed new regulations on employers, requiring them to document the legal status of their workers, among other things.
The research project was directed by social science professor Andrew Alvarado, statistics analyst Gary Riley, and agricultural economist Bert Mason. Funding came from the U.S. Department of Labor and the California Employment Development Department (EDD).
The trio directed interviews of more than 1,400 agricultural workers from 1988 to 1993. The work was conducted by research teams with support from Fresno State's California Agricultural Technology Institute (CATI) and Center for Agricultural Business (CAB).
Research data was collected from virtually all types of farm workers, including men, women, documented and undocumented, those employed directly by a grower and those employed by farm labor contractors. The most recent studies included interviews with entire families of workers, in order obtain more details on possible broader impacts of the IRCA.
Among the key changes determined by the researchers was the increased role of farm labor contractors as overseers of seasonal farm labor.
Growers' primary reasons for using contractors "are to avoid the cumbersome and voluminous paperwork, the procedural obstacles associated with document checking and legal status verification, and, of course, the potential culpability involved in knowingly hiring an undocumented or fraudulently-documented worker."
Efforts to reduce illegal immigration also have had little effect. "Workers in all the leading labor-intensive crops in 1993 reported an even greater proportion of undocumented or fraudulently-documented workers in the seasonal labor force than reported in 1988." This is believed by some to be a factor in the general lack of wage increases, the authors note.
Overall purpose of the 50-page report is to provide public and private sector leaders with a sound resource to use when they attempt to formulate policies and programs involving seasonally employed agricultural workers and their families.
The document is entitled, "The California Agricultural Labor Marker in 1993." Limited copies are available from CATI. For more information on the study, contact CAB at (559) 278-4405. For a copy of the report, see the Publications available form on Page 7.
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Copyright © 2000. All rights reserved.
CALIFORNIA AGRICULTURAL TECHNOLOGY INSTITUTE - CATI
College of Agricultural Sciences and Technology
California State University, Fresno