Located in:
- Program-Specific Requirements for Wagner-Peyser Program (Employment Services)
All Program-Specific Requirements provided for the WIOA core programs in this section must be addressed for either a Unified or Combined State Plan.
e. 2. An assessment of the agricultural activity in the State means: 1) Identifying the top five labor-intensive crops, the months of heavy activity, and the geographic area of prime activity; 2) Summarize the agricultural employers’ needs in the State (i.e. are they predominantly hiring local or foreign workers, are they expressing that there is a scarcity in the agricultural workforce); and 3) Identifying any economic, natural, or other factors that are affecting agriculture in the State or any projected factors that will affect agriculture in the State
Current Narrative:
ESD’s Data Architecture, Transformation & Analytics (DATA, formerly Labor Market and Economic Analysis, LMEA) division publishes an annual agricultural workforce report. In its most recent 2017 report, it stated that Washington remains one of the top states in terms of average annual covered agriculture employment with 97,810 in 2017, a 2.6% annual increase when compared to 75,763 in 2007. According to ESD data, agricultural employment peaked in 2018 at 99,633, and, as per their most recent figures, was at 87,991 in 2022. The agricultural industry’s significance to Washington’s economy is far-reaching. According to the 2022 USDA/NASS State Agricultural Overview, Washington state has 35,200 farms covering 14.5 million acres with agricultural production valued at $13.02 billion in 2022. The top commodities within our vibrant agricultural industry are led by the apple industry, which accounts for 70 percent of US production. The top 10 crops in Washington based on data reported by USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics are: 1) apples; 2) milk; 3) wheat; 4) hay; 5) potatoes; 6) hay; 7) hops; 8) cherries; 9) grapes; and 10) carrots. Of those top commodities, there are several that require the support of a significant seasonal labor force, including apples, potatoes, hops, cherries, and grapes. Other top commodities in the state that are dependent on a seasonal labor force include asparagus, berries, onions, and pears.
The geographic location of these agricultural activities is illustrated in the map below, which breaks down Washington into 6 Agricultural reporting areas. The majority of the MSFWs congregate in Washington’s central region in areas 2, 3, 4, and 5, but regions 1 and 6 have started to attract more MSFWs as the agricultural industry continues to grow and diversify. Like construction, agricultural work is seasonal, with crop activities peaking from June through October, depending on the commodity and activity in question.
The latest findings from ESD's 2022 Agricultural Peak Employment Wage and Practices Employer & Worker Survey Results also offers an overview of the state's agricultural sector. The agricultural landscape in Washington remains vibrant and crucial to the state's economy, employing a large workforce across various commodities and activities. ESD's DATA division has conducted an agricultural wage and practice survey annually since 2015, surveying for occupations and activities for which employers have requested temporary foreign laborers through the agricultural recruitment system (ARS). Prior to 2015, DATA conducted an agricultural wage and practice survey on a biennial basis for select agricultural commodities.
Agricultural employers in Washington state consistently communicate that their primary concern is access to a legal and stable workforce. The decrease in the agricultural workers in Washington has increased dependency on the H-2A program to meet that need. The 2020 survey iteration identified 81 different combinations of agricultural commodity-activity, with significant labor requirements noted in apple harvesting and pruning, as well as cherry and berry activities. The number of H-2A applications filed in Washington State in 2007 was 26, and the number of workers requested was 1,688. Those figures have continued to increase dramatically every year, and in 2023 Washington State received 428 H-2A applications for a total of 38,666 workers requested. When compared to 2007, the number of applications submitted in 2017 increased by more than 700 percent, while the total number of H-2A workers requested in the state increased by more than 1,000 percent. The increased demand in H-2A along with the states limited ability to administer this demanding program led to adoption of SB 5438 which creates the Office of Agricultural and Seasonal Workforce Services intended to implement a field check system that aims to enhance technical assistance to agricultural employers and farmworkers while forming a committee that provides recommendations for strengthening domestic worker recruitment.
The 2022 survey results revealed a significant reliance on the H-2A program, with prevailing wage rates for various commodity-activities such as apple pruning and cherry harvesting reflecting the sector's dependency on seasonal labor. This reliance underscores the critical need for a stable labor force to support the state's agricultural productivity.