farm labor

Dolores Huerta: The Civil Rights Icon Who Showed Farmworkers 'Sí Se Puede'

7:36pm September 17, 2017

by Maria Godoy

A key architect of the nationwide grape boycott that galvanized the farmworkers' rights movement, her legacy has long been overshadowed. A new film aims to change that. Huerta speaks with NPR.

The workers planting apple trees at this orchard in Wenatchee, Wash., came to the U.S. on temporary visas for farm workers.

Government Confirms A Surge In Foreign Guest Workers On U.S. Farms

3:28pm May 18, 2017

by Dan Charles

Government statistics show a big increase in the number of foreign guest workers approved to work on American farms this year. It's up 36 percent over the same period last year.

Alberto and Javier are pickers at Blueberry Hill Farms.

National

For Pickers, Blueberries Mean Easier Labor But More Upheaval

9:15am July 13, 2016

by Dan Charles

Many farm workers call blueberries their favorite crop to pick. It pays well and the work is comfortable. But there's a catch: It's a short season, and workers and their families have to keep moving.

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Harvesting oranges near Arcadia, Fla. The sacks that workers carry weigh about 90 pounds when they are full of fruit.

Guest Workers, Legal Yet Not Quite Free, Pick Florida's Oranges

10:31am January 28, 2016

by Dan Charles

Most workers who are picking oranges in Florida are temporary "guest" workers from Mexico. They have signed contracts to work only for growers who arranged their visas and provide their housing.

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Harvesting sweet potatoes: Workers sort the potatoes in the field, collecting small and large ones in different buckets. Each bucket weighs 30 pounds or so. A worker will shoulder that bucket and dump it into a flatbed truck 400 to 500 times a day. It's a

Economy

Behind Your Holiday Sweet Potato Dish, Hard Work In The Fields

3:12pm November 24, 2015

by Dan Charles

More than half of America's sweet potatoes were lifted by hand from the soil of North Carolina. It's some of the most back-breaking farm work to be found, and migrant laborers do most of it.

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Jose Martinez in the Adams County, Pa., orchard where he's working this year. He's been coming to the county for the apple harvest for the last 13 years.

National

Inside The Life Of An Apple Picker

5:55am October 23, 2015

by Dan Charles

It's apple-picking time. For some of us, that's casual recreation. For tens of thousands of people, though, it's a paycheck — and one stop in a migratory life.

Filipino farmworkers, including Larry Itliong (left), were the first to walk out of vineyards, prompting the Delano Grape Strike. They would join forces with Mexican laborers led by Cesar Chavez to form the United Farm Workers.

National

Grapes Of Wrath: The Forgotten Filipinos Who Led A Farmworker Revolution

2:25pm September 23, 2015

by Lisa Morehouse

Cesar Chavez inspired the world; Larry Itliong inspired Cesar Chavez. In 1965, the Filipino laborer led California grape pickers on a strike that would spark the modern farmworker movement.

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The California Pepper Commission says mechanical harvesters to pick hot and bell peppers could help solve labor shortage problems.

National

4 Labor-Intensive Crops Farmers Wish They Had Robots To Harvest

5:13pm September 14, 2015

by Eliza Barclay

Many fruits and vegetables must be harvested by hand because it's hard and costly to design machines that won't damage them. But as farm labor dwindles, there's a new push to develop more farm robots.

Farmer Issiaka Ouedraogo walks past cocoa pods growing on a tree, on a cocoa farm outside the village of Fangolo, near Duekoue, Ivory Coast in May 2011.

World News

Why The World Might Be Running Out Of Cocoa Farmers

3:16pm July 05, 2015

by Eliza Barclay

West African cocoa farmers earn less than $1 a day. Those low wages could jeopardize the future of chocolate labor, as young farmers find better opportunities to earn a living, a new report warns.