On June 17, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) issued new agency guidance stating that the dairy industry qualifies for H-2A visa petitions for temporary and seasonal workers. The implementing policy memorandum marks a shift from previous policy which excluded dairy employers from accessing H-2A workers because it was not considered seasonal work due to its year-round nature.
The H-2A visa is uncapped under existing law, meaning that the dairy industry – and all H-2A industries – will now have access to an unlimited supply of nonimmigrant guest workers. In Fiscal Year (FY) 2024 alone, the State Department issued 315,328 H-2A nonimmigrant visas. Data from the Department of Labor (DOL) shows the top states seeking H-2A workers in FY 2024 were Florida (47,416), Georgia (43,436), California (37,511) and Washington (35,884), together making up over 42 percent of all H-2A positions sought. The top occupational employment categories for FY 2024 were crop, nursery, and greenhouse farmworkers (83 percent) and operators of agricultural equipment (8.3 percent).
Although the dairy industry has been pushing for H-2A expansion for years, this policy change does little to effectively modernize America’s agricultural workforce. Instead, it increases competition in the labor market and depresses wages by introducing a new class of laborers willing to accept lower wages. Further, this dynamic prevents American farms from adopting labor-saving automation technology already widely used by farms throughout Europe and Asia.
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