FRUIT producers are in a pickle. The pandemic has compounded their problems in almost eliminating the regular source of their casual workforce, foreign workers and backpackers.
Of late, a lot of accusation of inaction has been levelled at the State Government in not providing a suitable avenue for foreign workers to overcome the very real restrictions being imposed to stop the spread of the COVID-19 virus and serve the needs of the farmers.
But in light of all the issues produced by international arrivals, particularly with the tennis tournament being the primary, if not sole source of disease transmission, is the action by the State to the betterment of the general population even if it goes against the interest of the farmers?
The other side of the farmer problem is that they cannot attract a suitable workforce from the general population. A common lament is they largely hold Australian workers as being lazy and unprepared to get off the welfare train, and ill prepared to work in a farm environment with long hours and hot conditions.
The Goulburn Valley region currently has a higher level of unemployment than the rest of the country, youth unemployment is in the order of 17 percent so it is not as if an available workforce is not there.
There are any number of industries that are dirty, hard and hot. Construction for one, mining, even some manufacturing jobs, yet they can still all manage to find workers without having to rely upon the government to solve their problems.
The foreign workers come cheap. From my own experiences working in the Pacific, typically Pacific islanders will work for around $20 a day. Getting ten dollars an hour is an absolute bonus so they will willingly come for six months with no expectation of working conditions.
Countries around the world have developed a reliance for cheap foreign labour, migrant workers to the US and the UK, to the Middle East, even between different Asian countries.
The problem is that local workers will not descend to that loss of income or acceptable working conditions. Farmers in Queensland are finding that if they pay over award fixed rates and support working conditions other industries have to provide, they have a steady stream of workers and continued fruit production.
This pandemic is not going away and there is little chance that the government is going to relax the rules for one particular industry above all others.
Farmers may have to bite the bullet and rethink where they are going to source their workers from and what it will take to get them and that will not be easy. Their options at the moment seems to be let the fruit rot on the ground rather than change their practice and that is a problem.
