Abstract

Among the most salient and intractable challenges facing labor-intensive western agriculture is the rapidly rising cost of labor, driven primarily by reduced availability of workers. Unlike field grains, oilseeds, and cotton, producers of fresh fruit and vegetables still rely extensively on hired manual labor to carry out multiple tasks, particularly harvesting. Nearly one third of total U.S. agricultural labor expenses occur in California alone, a state dominated by fruit, vegetable and horticultural (FVH) crops (Win, Rutledge, and Maredia, 2024). To address the rising cost of labor, producers have been adopting several innovations leading to automated irrigating, weeding, and crop protection (pesticide applying) systems. For harvesting, however, progress has been slow. In addition, imports of fresh fruit and vegetables are rising in response to higher production costs and increasing demand for these products in the United States, as well as differences in seasonality that allows imports to extend the availability of fresh products in the U.S.

This report provides an estimate of labor use in nine key western FVH crops and discusses the potential for labor-saving automation to help producers address higher labor costs and other constraints in the labor market. The crops addressed are the following - strawberries, table grapes, broccoli, iceberg lettuce, romaine lettuce, avocados, oranges, peaches, and plums. The report estimates the total labor demand for these crops and the share of labor used in harvesting versus cultivation tasks. The report also reviews literature on innovation and automation in agriculture and the role it can play in addressing labor shortages. To assess the landscape of automated technology commercially available and under development, the report includes findings from a comprehensive survey of attendees at FIRA 2023, an agriculture automation trade show that took place in Salinas, California, in September 2023. The report augments these findings by interviewing 3 prominent growers, supplemented by conversations with other growers. Finally, the report provides a crop-by-crop overview of the state of automated production and potential for further labor saving through automation.

Disciplines

Agribusiness

Number of Pages

35

Publisher statement

Copyright 2025 by Hamilton, Lohmar, and McCullough. All rights reserved. Readers may make verbatim copies of this document for non-commercial purposes by any means, provided that this copyright notice appears on all such copies.

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URL: https://digitalcommons.calpoly.edu/agb_fac/165