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Where Are the Jobs? Farm work is seasonal, with plant- ing and harvesting the busiest times of year. The work is, obvi- ously, mostly outdoors in fields, orchards, or vineyards. Long hours and six- or seven-day workweeks are common during planting and harvesting seasons. Farmworkers are outside for many hours in all kinds of weather. The sun can be es- pecially hard to deal with, but there also may be cold, wind, and rain. Working during all of the daylight hours may mean commuting to and from work in the dark. During the workday, there may be limited access to water, food, shelter, and bathroom facilities. Since farm work is seasonal, you may need to obtain alternative employment in the off-season. Some farmworkers, called migrant workers, move to new locations as crops ripen or to begin a grow- ing season. This unsettled lifestyle is sometimes temporarily enjoyable to younger workers. Some jobs come with bunk-style shared housing, but some jobs do not provide accommodation. It depends, in part, on the size of the agricultural operation and the distance to suitable housing for the workers. A Typical Day Here are the highlights for a typical day for a farmworker on a large agribusiness farm during harvest season. Get up before dawn. Because most agricultural work is performed outdoors, laborers rely on natural light to see what they are doing. In order to take advantage of all the daylight in the fields, it is necessary to travel to work while it is still dark. TALKING TRENDS Agricultural jobs in general are expected to decline, but job turn- over is high and opportunities should prove readily available for the foreseeable future. Consolidation of farms, technical advances in farm equipment, and trade agreements with foreign countries are mainly responsi- ble for the projected decline in overall jobs. However, jobs are expected to open up as con- sumers turn increasingly to farmers’ markets and local businesses when buying produce. Farmworkers are increasingly likely to be employed by farm labor contractors rather than being directly hired by the farms them- selves.

Farmworker  •

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