Alabama crops rot as workers vanish to avoid crackdown

[Equinox Moon]

Brian Cash can put a figure to the cost of Alabama's new immigration law: at least $100,000. That's the value of the tomatoes he has personally ripening out in his fields and that are going unpicked because his Hispanic workforce vanished literally overnight.

For four months every year he employs almost exclusively Hispanic male workers to pick the harvest. This year he had 64 men out in the fields.
Then HB56 came into effect, the new law that makes it a crime not to carry valid immigration documents and forces the police to check on anyone they suspect may be in the country illegally.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/oct/14/alabama-immigration-law-workers

Change is coming to America on many fronts.

[trof]

1. This article is 5 years old

[Equinox Moon]

7. I did not realize. It was a fresh post in The Guardian this morning.

It looked spot on relevant to what is happening now.

[stopbush]

2. This article is from 2011. Your point?

[still_one]

6. This article isn't, and it suggests what may be one of the results of the point the OP was making

California Farmers Backed Trump, but Now Fear Losing Field Workers

MERCED, Calif. — Jeff Marchini and others in the Central Valley here bet their farms on the election of Donald J. Trump. His message of reducing regulations and taxes appealed to this Republican stronghold, one of Mr. Trump’s strongest bases of support in the state.

As for his promises about cracking down on illegal immigrants, many assumed Mr. Trump’s pledges were mostly just talk. But two weeks into his administration, Mr. Trump has signed executive orders that have upended the country’s immigration laws. Now farmers here are deeply alarmed about what the new policies could mean for their workers, most of whom are unauthorized, and the businesses that depend on them.

“Everything’s coming so quickly,” Mr. Marchini said. “We’re not loading people into buses or deporting them, that’s not happening yet.” As he looked out over a crew of workers bent over as they rifled through muddy leaves to find purple heads of radicchio, he said that as a businessman, Mr. Trump would know that farmers had invested millions of dollars into produce that is growing right now, and that not being able to pick and sell those crops would represent huge losses for the state economy. “I’m confident that he can grasp the magnitude and the anxiety of what’s happening now.”

Mr. Trump’s immigration policies could transform California’s Central Valley, a stretch of lowlands that extends from Sacramento to Bakersfield. Approximately 70 percent of all farmworkers here are living in the United States illegally, according to researchers at University of California, Davis. The impact could reverberate throughout the valley’s precarious economy, where agriculture is by far the largest industry. With 6.5 million people living in the valley, the fields in this state bring in $35 billion a year and provide more of the nation’s food than any other state.

The consequences of a smaller immigrant work force would ripple not just through the orchards and dairies, but also to locally owned businesses, restaurants, schools and even seemingly unrelated industries, like the insurance market.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/09/us/california-farmers-backed-trump-but-now-fear-losing-field-workers.html?_r=0

[Equinox Moon]

25. Yep.

This is a big deal. I remember this article.

As I realize that The Guardian had re-published this article from 2011, it brings up the issue that Pres. Obama was the cause of the deportations at that time. It would be an interesting thread to discuss why we are protesting now about it and we didn't in 2011.

Trump is not going to back down. He will essentially shut down our food production because of it and America will learn who has been working the fields and harvesting the food we eat every day.

[yallerdawg]

34. This article was about Alabama's draconian "immigration" policies.

Not Obama's.

Alabama basically determined anyone who looks Hispanic can be investigated and held, and went as far as requiring police, troopers, and school employees to act as immigration enforcement!

Courts tossed out a lot, but census figures indicating declining Hispanic/Latino population in Alabama indicate "the message" was loud and clear.

[Equinox Moon]

10. It is a fresh post in The Guardian this morning.

America will now learn who is harvesting their food. Even though I did not realize this was a post from 2011, it is relevant now, which is why I would assume, The Guardian re-published it.

But now that I see the date, 2011, that was during Pres. Obama's time and we do know he deported many people. It is an interesting discussion we could have in another thread regarding why we protest trump's deportations, and not Obama's? That would be for another thread.

[dixiegrrrrl]

37. I looked to see the date as soon as I saw "growing tomatoes" in Ala. this time of year

And as you say, the issue is still valid now with current ICE operations.

It's up to the agricultural states to give harvesting feedback to the moron in chief.

[lame54]

3. KFC doesn't use many tomatoes - so he's fine

[bravenak]

4. I want to know how the Trump humping farmers are going to handle picking their own crops.

[dalton99a]

8. +1

[rug]

11. I want to know why they're not being arrested for violating immigration laws.

[bravenak]

12. White

[rug]

15. And propertied.

[bravenak]

21. So colonial

[rug]

33. Imperialism is the highest stage of capitalism.

https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/

[beachbum bob]

5. we will see 100's of thousands of field hands disappear and millions of dollars of crops rot in

alabama, florida, mississippi, texas.....and california

loss income for farmers who more than likely supported Trump


karma is a bitch

[Equinox Moon]

9. This will be a huge turning point for our food industry.

I wonder if we shift to multiple solutions, such as more home and community gardens.

[bravenak]

14. Me and my mom have a big yard here and are already planning for our garden

Making it much bigger this year on account of our fears of not having cheap, fresh veggies. Cant live like that.

[Equinox Moon]

16. Even at the gas station check out people were talking about growing their own food.

I plan to expand my garden this year too.

[bravenak]

22. Smart. Glad to see we are all on the same pages

[Equinox Moon]

26. We even have a program in the city for "public food".

Fruit trees and public veggie gardens for anyone to come and eat from. It has been an interesting development.

[bravenak]

27. We need to do that

We have a really strange growing season. So much daylight that the cabbages are like monsters

[Equinox Moon]

31. It's a great idea growing from grassroots efforts.

The homeless keep an eye on the free food and the wildlife. It benefits everyone and all of life.

[bravenak]

32. Oh hell. I forgot about the moose and bears.

Well, if they come to eat it I guess we can just let them have what they want. Moose are meaner than bears.

[underpants]

19. There's not nearly enough time of space to recreate the production of these industries

As I've said for years, all this is just talk. When meats (including seafood) veggie hospitality and construction want something done - they don't - it will be done.

[Equinox Moon]

23. I re-read your comment twice and cannot understand it.

I mean a literal sense.

[underpants]

24. I meant that individuals or even groups can't produce enough

to make the massive amount of goods that these industries do on a daily basis.

[Equinox Moon]

28. Okay. I get it. Thanks.

We might see Americans eating and living a simpler life. Back to the basics and away from mass production. I'm all for it.

[Wounded Bear]

18. And food shortages and higher prices for all of us...

Thanks Trump.

[Equinox Moon]

29. Maybe.

Yet, maybe the shift will be to a more simple way of living. No more mass production of food stuff. The mega food companies could go out of business. (?)

[Wounded Bear]

30. We wish...

I know that literally thousands of acres of good farmland has been plowed under and developed into industry and warehousing within 20 miles of where I live. Will be hard to recover local farming around here. There are a few co-ops and such, and we do farmers markets, so there is some.

[Coventina]

13. I wonder for whom Mr. Cash voted?

[underpants]

17. Aaaand who didn't see that coming?

Oh, Trump's ivory tower economic team

We'll see what the meats veggie construction hospitality industries think about this.

[Achilleaze]

20. Thank you republican Comrade Casino

[yallerdawg]

35. This is an example of the ongoing Alabamafication of America!

More like a warning!

[bucolic_frolic]

36. Yes

I had such a conversation with a Trumpie last fall. I said to her, if they start
deporting, every restaurant won't have a dishwasher and there will be no labor
to mow lawns. "Oh, no, that's not a problem, Americans will do those jobs."

Yup.