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President’s plan doesn’t address ag’s concerns

President Obama’s executive order on immigration does not include the guest worker program sought by the agriculture industry.

Chuck Connor, president and CEO of the National Council of Farmer Cooperatives and chair of the Agriculture Workforce Coalition, says that while the President’s actions will alleviate some pressure in the short term, it does not offer agricultural workers, their families or their employers the long term assurance they deserve.

“We need a program that acknowledges that there’s about 1.4 million agricultural workers already in this country that don’t have proper legal status,” Connor says. “We need to retain those workers. This is about 70 percent of our workforce.

“We can’t provide food and fiber for American and lose these workers. We’ve got to give some kind of legal status to that particular group of people.”

Connor says agriculture needs a valid, working guest worker program to replace the current H-2A program, which he says is “broken beyond repair”.

“It cannot be created without legislative activity,” he says. “We need Congress to act and we need the President to work with them to put that plan together.”

AUDIO: Chuck Connor

American Farm Bureau Federation president Bob Stallman echoes Connor’s comments. Stallman says Congress must pass legislation “that addresses border security and enforcement, improves an outdated agricultural visa program and gives experienced agricultural workers a way to gain legal status”.

Photo: Business Insider