8 Chris Ramsaroop/ Contributor OUT OF the ashes of the Farmworker Modernisation Act, the Biden administration has announced its intention to implement a new pathways scheme for agricultural guest workers in the United States. Responding to a comment from Fox News Digital, the United States Citizenship Immigration and Services state that they are “committed to promoting policies and procedures that break down barriers in the immigration system, increase access to eligible immigration benefits, enhance protections for temporary non-immigrant workers, and better ensure the integrity of the H-2A and H-2B programmes”. According to theWilson Centre, the H2A programme has seen astronomical growth. From2013 to 2022, the number of participants increased threefold from 100,000 to 317,000. Mexican workers comprise the lion’s share of participants of 93 per cent while Jamaica is number three on the list with two per cent. Curiously, South Africa has the second most participants (three per cent) in the H2A programme, leading to allegations of racism in states such as Mississippi where African-American farm workers are being replaced by white South Africans. One wonders whether the Biden administration will heed the lessons of this recent defeat. The FWMA would have expanded the use of the H2 worker programme in agriculture and permitted the use of the H2 programme in year-round operations such as the dairy industry. While there was promise to develop a pathways system of immigration for some undocumented workers, in reality it was a very small opening that acted more like a lottery system rather than a system based on need. SYSTEMIC POWER IMBALANCES Despite assurances from the federal government to implement harsher penalties for employers and recruiters who violate the conditions of the H2 programme, these measures do not address systemic wide issues. OnMarch 30, 2023, the Occupational Health and Safety Administration will be given new powers to certify applications for U Visas (witnesses in criminal investigations) and T Visas (victims of human trafficking) when the agency identifies ‘criminal activities in the workplace’. The new powers are heralded as providing legal status for both undocumented workers and guest workers to assist investigations into labour violations. However, these changes are reactive and do nothing to address wider systemic power imbalances that put workers with precarious immigration status under vulnerable conditions in the first place. Rather than listen to employers, what would an immigration system look like if workers such as Servano Jimenez were involved in the creation of immigration reforms for farm workers? Writing in Labornotes Jimenez argues, “I know just how gruelling year-round agricultural work is and how difficult it can be to make ends meet as an undocumented farmworker. After coming to the United States from Oaxaca, Mexico, I spent years picking grapes and after that, working on dairy farms. Farmwork wasn’t my first choice, but as an undocumented person, there weren’t any other options for me.” PUSH FACTORS Immigration reform can not and should not be a one-way street. In the current hysteria and xenophobia that informs immigration reforms, very little thoughtful analysis exists of the push factors that are leading to migration. These include the impact of economic trade agreements such as CUMSA and its predecessor NAFTA, and the consequences of climate change on small farms across the Americas. Furthermore, Jimenez notes the conditions that agricultural workers currently face as a result of current power imbalances in the industry. “In just 10 years of farm work, my body was broken, leaving me unable to support myself. This is physically demanding work with long hours and little pay (that) can damage the body in just a few years.” In fact, the confluence of US trade policies that focus on export-oriented agriculture and immigration policies that advocate the expansion of H2 programmes are pitting guest workers and undocumented workers against one another. Rather than targeting the US’s hegemonic dominance in agriculture, workers are in competition with one another for crumbs while the industry prospers. Jimenez’s words must be a rallying cry for change, change that uplifts workers, not perpetuates a race to the bottom. Immigration reform should not be a one-way street Ramsaroop. CONTRIBUTED THE MONTHLY GLEANER | MARCH 9 - APRIL 8, 2023 | www.jamaica-gleaner.com | NEWS
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