The government has announced that it will extend the Seasonal Worker visa route from 2025 to 2029. This is in response to the dramatic increase in the demand for migrant workers via this route.
The visa quota for horticulture rises from 2500 in 2019 to 45000 in 2024. Meanwhile, he number of visas available to the horticulture sector in 2025 will be set at 43000 with another 2000 visas for poultry.
The government expects the horticulture and poultry sectors to reduce demand for migrant worker visas over the next 5 years. It agrees to recommendations and calls on the sector and its employers to do more to attract and retain British workers.
It is also the government’s ambition to turbo-charge automation in the horticulture sector to help boost productivity and help it transition away from low-skilled migrant labour as soon as possible. They recognise that automation advancements cannot happen immediately. However, they are committed to incentivise and support the sector to automate, such as by bringing prototypes to human picking parity, to deliver the huge economic and technological benefits it offers.
The quota levels for Seasonal Worker visas from 2026 to 2029 will be published later this year.
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