Fed’s H-2A labor costs leave N.C. farmers struggling to compete

“Any material that we have had to purchase, 20% to 30% up on clamshells boxes, fertilizer over 100% up, fuel was crazy. Even this spring, with some of the crops bringing better pricing than last year, we still made more money last year because when you look at all of our costs with labor and everything being up, we didn’t do any better.” - Ron Cottle, Faison, N.C.