By Bruce Cochrane.
A retired Extension Educator in the area of workforce development and management for agriculture suggests, as the pork industry becomes more dependant on immigrant labor, it becomes important to incorporate different cultures into the culture of farm.
As the result of increasing difficulty finding and attracting people who are willing to work on farms the pork sector has become more reliant on immigrant workers.
Chuck Schwartau, a retired Extension Educator with the University of Minnesota in the area of workforce development and management for agriculture, notes we are finding immigrant workers are dependable, they are reliable and they are wanting to work.
Chuck Schwartau-University of Minnesota:
We need to look at things that can blend culture of the farm and the culture from which some of these employees come.
We need to have a better understanding of some of their ways of working.
What are things that impact their lives?
What are family situations that impact when and how they work and perhaps where they work as well because you want to have people that are comfortable in a community, want to be there and then will be better workers for you and be more involved.
So we need to be really cognizant of what are the cultural issues that effect some of these employees that maybe first of all brings them to a community or what are the cultural things that will keep them in the community and how do we work with them.
How do they learn?
Do they learn by reading, do they learn by showing, do you need to demonstrate, do you need to give them hands on working with them so that they learn some of these situations.
Those are things that we need to learn in order to help teach employees.
Schwartau says it's a real challenge finding employees so it's important to keep them.
He says research has shown that, as a result of reorganizing duties, recruiting, hiring and training replacement employees and lost productivity, the cost of employee turnover can be one and a half to two times what you're paying that person.
Source: Farmscape