Migration from Mexico to U.S. is tapering off. How does this impact farmers?

A recent newsletter from Harvest Automation, the start-up company that produces robots that move potted plants at nurseries and greenhouses, cites two very revealing trends regarding migrant workers.

These two trends are causing a double whammy for American farmers:

1.    Shifting migration patterns have come to a point where migration from the US into Mexico is slightly higher than from Mexico into the US. From a high of 2.9 million inflow from Mexico to the U.S. in the late 1990’s to the present 1.37 inflow vs. 1.39 outflow, things have radically changed.

2.    Mexican workers are moving into other industries from traditional farm work, while at the same time Mexican farms are increasing their wages in an attempt to keep farm workers from moving to higher-paying factory and office jobs, adding additional pressure on agriculture in the US.

Consequently the metrics of using robotic solutions in agriculture is rapidly changing.

Harvest Automation has provided an economic robotic solution for the nursery and greenhouse sector of the ag industry. Other companies are busy field testing various robotic devices for harvesting, pruning, weeding, providing data, etc. Things are happening fast. Stay tuned!

If you liked this article, you may also be interested in:

• Harvey: A working robot for container crops
• Harvest Automation rolls out bots for nurseries
• Lay of the land: Unmanned systems coming to commercial agriculture
• From precision farming to autonomous farming: How commodity technologies enable revolutionary impact
•  Matching technology to value creation: Drones in agriculture

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Frank Tobe is the owner and publisher of The Robot Report, and is also a panel member for Robohub's Robotics by Invitation series.

Frank Tobe is the owner and publisher of The Robot Report, and is also a panel member for Robohub's Robotics by Invitation series.