French Farmers Seek Domestic Labor Amid Shortage of Moroccan Seasonal Workers

The FNSEA launched a call for "general mobilization" last Thursday for Frenchmen deprived of activity to come and work in the fields, reports France bleu. The purpose of this call is to avoid, as at the beginning of the health crisis, difficulties related to the harvesting of strawberries and asparagus. Difficulties caused by the absence of foreign seasonal workers, particularly Moroccans.

Christiane Lambert, president of the FNSEA, has discussed the matter with Prime Minister Jean Castex. She has expressed her concerns to him. The question is whether the exemptions and health protocols put in place last year to continue bringing in seasonal workers, particularly from Morocco and Tunisia, especially in the Vaucluse, will be renewed.

Virginie Fraysse, a producer and president of the Carpentras Strawberry Protection Union, expresses the same concerns: "Like last year, we are afraid of not seeing any arms arrive, with the tightening of health measures that is being prepared, our usual seasonal workers will not come. And then with the announcements that are made day by day, we don’t know, that’s what’s complicated and there we are really in a big concern."