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<p>The Government recognises the importance of a reliable source of seasonal labour
for crop picking and packing, and that it is a key part of bringing in the harvest
for the horticultural sector.</p><p> </p><p>On 24 December 2021, the Government announced
that the seasonal worker visa route will be extended to 2024 to allow overseas workers
to come to the UK for up to six months to harvest both edible and ornamental crops.
This will provide a greater degree of certainty to the sector after a series of annual
pilots between 2019 and 2021. An initial allocation of 30,000 visas was made available
for 2022.</p><p> </p><p>We have just announced in the Food Strategy that the Government
will release an extra 10,000 visas for the Seasonal Worker visa route (bringing the
total to 40,000 visas for 2022) with 8,000 of these going to the horticulture sector
and 2,000 to the poultry sector. Further information on the operational details will
be provided very soon.</p><p> </p><p>We have also been working closely with the operators
of the Seasonal Worker visa route to ensure that they can source potential workers
in spite of the war in Ukraine. Operators are currently confident that they will be
able to replace affected workers by recruiting from other countries.</p><p> </p><p>The
recently announced Food Strategy addresses the challenges faced by the food and farming
sector, including a commitment to deliver an independent review to tackle labour shortages
in the food supply chain, considering the roles of automation, domestic labour and
migration routes.</p><p> </p><p>Defra’s Review of Automation in Horticulture will
also be published in early summer, to be followed by a formal Government response.
Defra continues to work with other Government departments to ensure that opportunities
for domestic recruitment are optimised.</p><p> </p>
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