Source:  LIsa M. Keefe, MEATINGPLACE, 5/26/11

Between $5 billion and $9 billion worth of agricultural products are dependent on undocumented workers to get them from the farm to the market, estimates Bob Stallman, president of the American Farm Bureau Federation.

Deportation, then, is not the solution to illegal immigration; comprehensive immigration reform is, Stallman told reporters on a conference call with USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack to discuss the issue.

And if comprehensive immigration reform proves politically impossible, any legislation passed addressing immigration issues should consider the unique needs of the agricultural industry, they said.

“One piece of comprehensive immigration reform is to make sure we have an adequate agricultural workforce,” he said. “Nobody knows how many are not authorized. They have the documents, but the employers don’t have the ability to verify the documents. That means a number of workers are at risk if we move forward to put more stringent restrictions in place.”

Vilsack noted that Americans spend only about half as much of their household budgets on food as residents of Italy or Japan. “Every time somebody takes a bite of food it’s been picked, processed and packed by somebody, and a fair number of these jobs are done by immigrants.”

The secretary blamed the failure of previous “good faith efforts” to bring about immigration reform on legislators with narrow agendas, and said the ideas proposed by President Obama two weeks ago would “continue our work to secure the borders, and also provide clear guidance for the vast majority of businesses that want to play by the rules.” 

the immigration picture — such as Obama’s proposals to improve the E-verify system — “we hope they understand … to take agriculture’s unique needs into consideration,” Vilsack said. 

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