Jock's Place - Food miles and fruit pickers - Comments

Not sure it's about cost

Jock — Sun, 10 Jun 2007 13:03:38 +0000

I don't get the impression that labour is too expensive. They say they are happily paying more than minimum wage and happily paying 20-25% more than agricultural minimums for the short term work. It's about permits. The A8 countries' workers will not come for such low grade work and John Reid has restricted the SAWS nation permits because he wants them to include in the Romanian/Bulgarian workers' quotas even though they now have the right to travel anywhere in the EU to work at whatever they want.

But you're right, I suspect the farmers will be okay. It's us who will end up with tasteless forced-grown overseas fruit transported further than necessary.

Remember when it was all the rage for UK soon to be students to pick grapes in France for next to nothing!

The farmers have nothing to

Tom Papworth — Sun, 10 Jun 2007 12:45:26 +0000

The farmers have nothing to fear, Jock.

I'm sure we'll find plenty more in the Common Agricultural Fund to compensate them for the fact that labour is too expensive to make their crops profitable as a result of our limiting the number of farm workers who would happily come and pick the crops cheaply.

As you say, bonkers.

Food miles and fruit pickers

Jock — Sun, 10 Jun 2007 10:19:30 +0000

A quite bonkers situation is highlighted today:

Migrant cap 'will hit fruit crop':

Thousands of pounds worth of strawberries could be lost

Much of this year's strawberry crop will not be harvested because of a cap on seasonal workers entering the UK, the National Farmers' Union has warned.
The NFU says the cap, which limits the number of non-EU citizens entering the country, is causing a shortage of fruit-pickers.