Stories
Meet the New Jersey Entrepreneur Helping 90,000 Children Eat Healthier
Jimena Florez started her first business at the age of 8, selling flavored Jell-O powders in straws to her Bogotá classmates. Now she’s the founder of Chaak Healthy Snacks, a socially conscious business that brings nutritional snacks to public school children in Colombia and the United States. Florez employs about… Read More
‘Imagine the Growth’ that Legalizing Immigrants Would Bring, Says Policy Analyst
“Immigrants have such great economic potential,” says Mexican-born economist and healthcare consultant Luis Arzaluz. “They come here, they learn the language — they buy cars — and they could contribute even more.” Why did he mention buying cars? Because Arzaluz has the automotive industry to thank for his U.S. citizenship. Read More
Colombian-American Student Helps U.S. Immigrants Gain Acceptance
Alejandro Londoño came to America from Colombia at the age of 6, speaking no English and carrying a pink bag with a radio and some toys. Now 20, she is a U.S. citizen and a senior at Stockton University, where she helped start a program to help immigrants prepare for… Read More
South Carolina Community Would Be Ghost Town Without Immigrants, Says Businessman
Saluda businessman Hector Ortiz knows exactly what would happen if the town’s foreign-born population was deported or left out of fear. “Without the immigrants to work at the poultry plants, this would become a ghost town,” he says. Ortiz, who runs an insurance company in the town of 3,500, points to… Read More
Millions of Dollars at Stake When Visas for Japanese Roe Technicians Delayed
It’s hard not to marvel at the organization of the Alaska seafood business, which maintains a reliably healthy fishery while pumping billions of dollars into the national economy every year. It begins with rigorous resource management by the state and ends with an elaborate, private, global distribution system. Smack in… Read More
Immigrants Ready, Able, and Needed on Wisconsin Dairy Farms
Mar-Bec Dairy has 900 dairy cows and grows feed on 1,800 acres. To keep the operation running, owner Marty Hallock depends on immigrants: 9 of his 17 full-time employees are from Mexico. “These people are committed to dairy farming,” he says, “and absolutely vital to my operation.” Without these steady… Read More
Award-Winning Dairy Farmer Depends on Immigrant Workforce
With 430 milk cows, Mitch Breunig’s family farm, Mystic Valley Dairy, in Sauk City, Wisconsin, is a large operation. The round-the-clock job of caring for the animals is done by the farm’s eight full-time employees, seven of whom are immigrants from Latin America. “They come to Wisconsin for the opportunity… Read More
Without Immigrants, Dairy States Would Suffer
In Shelly Mayer’s view, the United States isn’t facing an immigrant labor shortage but a rural labor shortage. Specifically, a farm labor shortage. Mayer is the executive director of the Professional Dairy Producers® (PDPW), a national development organization for dairy professionals. She sees the labor shortage problem close up, and it’s nationwide. “We have fewer farms,… Read More
Immigration Policy Needs to Support American Farms, Says Iowan
When the government makes it difficult for immigrants to come to the United States, “we’re shooting ourselves in the foot,” says John Weber, an Iowa farmer and past president of the National Pork Producers Council. His farm, Valley Lane Farms Inc., in Dysart, Iowa, produces 2,400 acres of feed corn… Read More
To Grow US. Apples, America’s Farmers Need Immigration Reform
In 2011, third-generation apple farmer Phil Glaize, drove up and down the eastern seaboard searching for farm workers. He had made a point of only hiring Americans to work his 650-acre farm, which produces roughly $5.5 million in revenue annually. But as the economy improved after the recession, he found… Read More
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