Harder Than You Think – Immigrant Labor Market Integration in Agricultural Sector

Abstract

The recent forced migration to Europe has created more challenges for the labor market integration. However, the Swedish government encourages unemployed immigrants to seek employment in the farming, gardening, and forestry industries. Thus, this article focuses on the matching process in the Swedish agricultural sector by using an exploratory, qualitative, in-depth interview with representatives involved in the matching process. Immigrants experience challenges of Swedish language proficiency, lacking a driving license and adapting to new cultures in the workplace, while employers attribute challenges of effective hiring process and the absence of evidence of immigrants’ work experience. Furthermore, the employment service offices struggle with scant knowledge of agricultural employment that needs to be combined with limited contact with employers and the bureaucratic delays caused by requirements of qualifications validation. The paper concludes with a Labour Market Matching Model, which focuses on critical aspects before, during, and after the matching process.

Employers’ perspectives on hiring immigrants

“…The employment gaps (see Figure 1) between native-born individuals and those from outside the EU have been relatively large across all of the Nordic countries (especially Sweden), and these gaps widened further during the COVID-19 pandemic (Sánchez Gassen et al, 2021). A prevailing challenge in all of the Nordic countries today is labour market mismatch in other words, the skills and prior labour market experiences of immigrants often do not align with those sought by Nordic employers (Barth & Zalkat, 2022). This discrepancy impacts both individuals and society at large.…”

“…Hiring immigrants is seen as one solution to these shortages, and as a way of ensuring businesses' operability and vitality (Bjerck et al, 2018). This is particularly evident in sectors facing a pronounced shortage of skills and talents, as in the agricultural sector (Barth & Zalkat, 2022). In industries such as ishing, in which native-born employees are often reluctant to work, or in sectors with high turnover, such as the grocery industry, or in sectors with an increased demand for seasonal workers, e.g.…”

“…There might be a perception among employers that training or integrating immigrants is more costly than hiring local personnel (Lundborg & Skedinger, 2016;Risberg & Romani, 2022;Tent, 2021). For example, this is evident in the agricultural sector in Sweden, where companies show reluctance to hire immigrants due to anticipated higher initial costs and the belief that local workers are a more secure investment (Barth & Zalkat, 2022;Højbjerre et al, 2023).…”