Farmers’ rights advocacy group the Taiwan Rural Front yesterday slammed the Council of Agriculture’s recent proposal to import foreign farming labor, saying the plan favors corporate farms while putting traditional farmers at a disadvantage and would result in exploitation of overseas workers.
The activist group accused Council of Agriculture Minister Chen Bao-ji (陳保基) of “fabricating” the issue of a lack of farm hands in the nation, as small family-run farms are still the foundation of the nation’s agriculture industry.
Taiwan Rural Front member Chen Ping-hsuan (陳平軒) said the council was trying to cover up mistakes in its policy enforcement, which have led to low incomes for households in farming communities over the past several decades, prompting young people to move to the cities to look for jobs.
Nevertheless, he said small farms have in recent years seen a resurgence of interest as more young people return to their hometowns to help on family farms.
Chen Ping-hsuan said that these farms help one another to make sure there is sufficient manpower during harvests, since not every family harvests crops at the same time, so the only people lacking farm hands are owners of large-scale corporate farms, who are always aiming to cut labor costs.
The plan laid out by Chen Bao-ji, which the minister has proposed putting to a trial run in January next year, would provide corporate farms with easy access to cheap foreign labor and the reduction in their production costs would allow them to expand the size of farms, which would pose a threat to the income of family-run farms and eventually destroy their livelihood, he said.
Chen Ping-hsuan said the proposed plan would also cause Taiwanese and foreign workers to be exploited as local employees who work for corporate farms — who he said are being paid meager salaries — would have to compete with even cheaper foreign labor and consent to being paid less in order to remain employed.
He criticized Chen Bao-ji for saying that farmers could be allowed to employ “seasonal” foreign workers that are dispatched to different parts of the nation with the changing of the seasons to cater to the needs of different employers, saying that such a proposal is against the Employment Service Act (外國人從事就業服務法).
Taiwan Rural Front spokeswoman Tsai Pei-hui (蔡培慧) also dismissed the council’s claim that there is a shortage of farm hands, saying that elderly people, residents who came to Taiwan through marriages and members of younger generations can all lend a helping hand.
Citing statistics published by the UN this year showing that small-scale farming is usually carried out in a more eco-friendly way than industrial farming, and provides consumers with healthier options when shopping for produce, she said the council should support small family-run farms to ensure a stable supply of consumer-friendly produce in the market, rather than deferring to corporate farms owned by large enterprises.
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