In the current corona crisis, the fruit, vegetable and potato processing industry (BOGK) ensures an even and safe supply of canned vegetables and fruits, potato products, jams, canned mushrooms and much more to the population. However, this safety of consumers is at risk because the 2020 harvest is in acute danger. Sowing, planting and harvesting are at stake due to the entry ban for foreign seasonal workers that has existed since last week. However, what has not been harvested cannot be processed. With the 2020 harvest, the annual production of fruit, vegetable and potato products could also fail. The supply of the population would no longer be secure from summer 2020.
BOGK chairman Konrad Linkenheil appeals to the federal government: "We definitely need our experts from countries like Bulgaria, Romania, Poland and other countries."
Because the companies rely on specially trained agricultural specialists from the neighboring countries of the EU.They have been coming back to the same factories for decades, where they are used as shift supervisors, raw material experts and in other indispensable functions. Even in the processing industry itself, you can't do without these experts.
At the same time, companies will do everything possible to integrate the workers who offer their work on the platforms that are emerging, such as "The Country Helps". However, the association chairman warns: "We have to assume that this will not be enough."
The 125 companies in the sector mainly process regionally grown raw materials, which must now be sown and planted so that they can be harvested from June (cucumber, peas, beans, potatoes) to November (cabbage). The industry employs 23,000 core workers and 20,000 seasonal workers during the harvest. The contract farmers from whom the companies source their raw materials need another 60,000 harvest helpers. The industry turnover is 7.4 billion euros per year.
Core requirement
From Easter, hopefully by May at the latest, the economy is expecting an exit from the previous measures (“exit strategy”).Seasonal workers from Poland and other EU countries want to come to Germany in May. You and your employers must now have binding knowledge of the rules that will apply.
Specific labor law requirements:
1.) Ensure arrival, exit and transit bilaterally without subsequent quarantine by land. Uniform regulation for all federal states.
2.) Consultation with EU colleagues who have the same problems.
3.) Make it possible to hire seasonal agricultural workers for the food industry.
4.) Opening employment opportunities in agriculture to refugees who have not yet had a work permit.
5.) Clear economic incentives for German workers to take up employment in agriculture, even if the social security system offers an alternative (help with unemployment, short-time allowance, additional earnings regulations, etc.).
6.) Increased communication through new job exchanges.
7.) Provide sufficient rapid tests for the entire workforce of food manufacturers and especially seasonal workers. As of April 1, according toStatement from BOSCH.
8.) Clear instructions to the regulatory authorities that the necessary operational processes in agriculture and the food industry sometimes do not allow maintaining a personal distance of 1.5 m, and that production should still continue.
Source
HANSA Terminhandel
