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NPPC applauds inclusion of visa reform in task force report

The National Pork Producers Council is pleased that a call for reform of the H-2A visa program was included in the administration’s Ag and Rural Prosperity Task Force Report released this week.

Iowa pork producer John Weber, immediate past president of NPPC, says current visa programs, while widely used by U.S. pork producers, are not effectively addressing the labor shortage faced by the industry.

“We have a substantial need for high quality immigrant labor that can come to this country, both in the production phase of pork as well as the processing phase,” Weber says.

Immigrant workers also deserve to have some certainty, Weber says.

“First of all, that they’re welcome to this country and that they’re going to have a good paying job—and then I think they should also have a future to look forward to, for themselves and for their families, with some certainty that they can work toward, so that we don’t have the turnover we do in our labor force.”

NPPC supports the Agricultural Guestworker Act in the House, which would create an H-2C program, allowing non-seasonal ag workers to remain in the U.S. for up to three years.