Farmers’ battle to find affordable labour adds to Britain’s post-Brexit woes
Keeping shop shelves stocked with fruit and vegetables has become a precarious — and murky — business for farmers and vulnerable workers, while food prices have soared 18%
26 March 2023 – 09:12
Fed up with life as a truck driver, Ermek believed it was worth paying about $2,000 in travel and visa fees for a job on a farm in the UK. What the 26-year-old from Kyrgyzstan did not expect was to be picked up at the airport, dropped in the English countryside after midnight and then given three days to master strawberry picking. He was fired after a month.
“I thought in Europe they valued their employees,” Ermek said from his home in southern Kyrgyzstan, where he returned in 2022. He declined to be identified by his full name for fear of reprisals from the recruiter. “They just abandoned us.”..
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