AUSTRALIA | According to a report from the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences (ABARES), labour shortages in the horticulture sector have eased slightly.
ABARES executive director Dr Jared Greenville said the report, based on a survey of over 2,000 horticulture farms across Australia, showed a fall in the number of farms struggling to find workers.
“Almost 34 percent of horticulture farms had difficulty recruiting workers in 2022–23, down from 57 percent in 2021–22,” said Dr Greenville.
“We’ve also seen a shift in the number of workers Australian horticulture farms use. The monthly average number of workers used by horticulture farms increased between 2021–22 and 2022–23 by around 1,500 people, rising from 116,900 to 118,400 workers.”
Dr Greenville said that they were aware that labour demand in horticulture is seasonal, but it was pleasing to see improvements in peak labour use, which rose by four percent or around 5,100 workers to a peak of 130,300 workers in 2022–23.
He added that this modest rise marked a turnaround from consecutive falls in the number of workers used over the preceding three years. The increase was primarily driven by the return of overseas working holidaymakers and, to a lesser extent, permanent workers.
These extra workers have essentially been hired by the largest horticulture farms, which was understandable as these farms bore the brunt of the total decrease in labour use from 2019–20 to 2021–22.
“Horticulture farmers have found ways around the net decline in workers. Around 40 percent of Australian horticulture farms used machinery like fruit picking machines to reduce their demand for labour in 2022–23. In other instances, the hours worked by existing employees increased.”
Farmers have also used labour-hire firms to overcome difficulties in filling vacancies. Nearly two-thirds (64 percent) of contract horticulture workers were employed through labour-hire firms during peak labour-use periods in 2022–23, up from 52 percent in 2019–20.
More from the report here
More horticulture news here
