Philip L. Martin
Professor of Agricultural Economics
University of California at Davis
In September the United Farm Workers (UFW) union held its 12th constitutional convention in Fresno. Perhaps more than those of any other U.S. union, the UFW's fortunes have mirrored the trends in illegal immigration. The union burst onto the national scene with a grape boycott in the late 1960s, after the Bracero Program terminated in 1964 and before illegal immigration surged. A total of "only" 212,000 illegal aliens were apprehended nationwide in 1969.
By 1970, the UFW had contracts with most major producers of table grapes, and in 1975 California enacted the Agricultural Labor Relations Act, which granted organizing and bargaining rights to farm workers. The UFW won 200 representation elections on California farms in the fall of 1975 and by 1978 had over 100 contracts. The number of contracts slid to about 60 in 1982 and has remained at 25 to 30 since 1983.
Four types of reasons have been advanced to explain the current situation. First, the low current rate of UFW representation has been attributed to previous internal leadership and strategy decisions that led the union to quit organizing and to isolate itself from farm workers. Second, some have charged that Republican governors have since 1982 failed to properly enforce the farm labor relations law.
Explanations based on two other factors - the changing structure of farm employment and escalating illegal immigration - are probably closer to the mark. A growing number of farm businesses have insulated themselves somewhat from union organizing by leasing rather than owning land and by relying on farm labor contractors and custom harvesters to provide workers when needed. Illegal immigration is greater than ever, even after provisions of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) enabled about one-sixth of the adult men in rural Mexico to become legal U.S. residents.
Farm wages have been falling since the early 1980s, along with the UFW's diminishing statewide influence, as many growers with contracts went out of business or bargained to an impasse on renewal agreements. The UFW's most significant recent victory was with Dole's Fresh Vegetable Oceanview Produce Company division. Dole is California's largest agricultural employer - with as many as 25,000 farm workers at times during a typical year. Its Oceanview division grows strawberries and vegetables during the spring and summer with 800 farm workers in Oxnard, north of Los Angeles. The UFW won a May 12, 1994, election, but Oceanview announced in August that it would stop growing strawberries, thus eliminating 450 of the jobs in the bargaining unit. Because it leases all of its 2,000 acres of farmland in the area, Dole had more flexibility to make this production decision than if it owned the land. The UFW has threatened a boycott of Dole products if the company in fact eliminates this strawberry operation.
Although many workers have been receptive to union organizers, less than 10 percent of the farm workforce has been covered by collective bargaining agreements at any time. UFW's quest to organize a substantially greater portion of the state's 900,000 farm workers will probably be limited for some time by the changing structure of farm employment and continuing illegal immigration.
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