Plenty of the vendors selling their goods at the farmers' market at the Agriculture Heritage Park are family-run businesses. Working a large farm in the hot, humid South can be a lot of work, even divided up between the family members.
Take Boozer Farms, for example, they started in 2003 growing peaches in Thorsby, Alabama.
They are now growing squash, strawberries, peppers and many other fruits and vegetables. And they are marketing in Birmingham, Helena, and Auburn.
“My dad handles production, my mom handles marketing, and I help maintain the bridge between marketing and the farm,” said Taylor Hatchett, who has been helping at her family’s farm since she was a kid. “My nieces are also helping me here at the market today.”
Between planting, growing, picking and marketing, the job of running a family-owned farm can be difficult. It can be even more difficult in the summer months when not many people want to work on a hot Alabama farm.
With so much food being produced and not enough workers to handle it, Boozer Farms looked to get workers through the H-2A program here in the states.
The H-2A temporary agricultural program allows agricultural employers who anticipate a shortage of domestic workers to bring nonimmigrant foreign workers to the U.S. to perform agricultural labor or services of a temporary or seasonal nature, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.
On April 1, Boozer Farms welcomed four new migrant workers from South Mexico. They provide housing, transportation and, of course, a job until August 15, 2016. The workers help them maintain their farm.
“It has been a huge blessing,” Hatchett said. “We have a great group of four guys who are always on time that want to work. We are farming more acres of ground this year than we have ever been able to do.”
Hatchet says the work is all specified in the contracts the workers sign. It can vary from harvesting to planting to maintaining the crops.
“There was a learning curve due to the language barrier in the beginning,” Hatchett said. “But by the third harvest they had it down.”
She also mentioned that even though these workers had experience working on farms in Mexico, they still had to learn American farming practices and how to use the machines.
“Depending on the schedule, my dad will check his Spanish dictionary the night before for the certain tasks he needs the workers to do that following day,” Hatchett said.
Many growers in Chilton County are involved in the H-2A program, Hatchett said other Chilton County-based farmers who sell at the Auburn market are also doing H-2A.
Boozer Farms plans to rehire these same four workers for more seasonal work starting in April 2017.
“It has made a huge difference in the amount of food we have been able to produce,” Hatchett said. “These guys really go above and beyond.”
The farmers' market at the Agriculture Heritage Park is open every Thursday afternoon during the summer from 3–6 p.m.
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