Agriculture Visa announced
Today the Australian government has confirmed that regulations to enable the creation of the Australian Agriculture Visa will be in place by the end of September.

The government has indicated that the visa would be open to partner countries, which would be confirmed pending government negotiations. AUSVEG understands that ASEAN countries remain high on the list of potential partners, including the Philippines and Vietnam, in line with industry’s preference for workers in the region.

The Australian Agriculture Visa will be available to workers across the agriculture (including meat processing), fisheries and forestry sectors. The program will be operated by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, building on the strong outcomes from Pacific labour mobility programs including the Seasonal Worker Programme and the Pacific Labour Scheme.

The Government will immediately commence industry consultations to understand needs across the agricultural sector. The departments of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Home Affairs and Agriculture, Water and the Environment will design the visa to ensure a high degree of integrity and safeguards for workers.

AUSVEG has already been in discussions with the departments of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Home Affairs and Agriculture, Water and the Environment and various Ministers and MPs to discuss the details of the Agriculture Visa, and will continue to do so to ensure that the priorities and concerns of growers are strongly considered in designing the visa.

The visa will be open to workers of all skill levels and permanent residency pathways for workers under this visa are being strongly considered, with more details to be finalised following further consultation.

The announcement has already generated significant media attention:

• New ag visa a ‘nation builder’ with pathway for rural settlement (Jamieson Murphy, Farm Online)
• Ag Visa to be in place by September (Chris Komorek, Produce Plus)
• Agriculture visa: Migrant farm workers to be offered permanent residency (Natalie Kotsios, The Weekly Times)
• Migrant farm workers to be offered pathway to permanent residency (Adeshola Ore, The Australian)
• New farm working visa to begin next month, providing pathway to permanent residence for foreigners (Kath Sullivan, ABC)

For more details, please see the Government’s announcement here, as well as AUSVEG’s media release response here.

The visa will add to the array of visas available for the Horticulture sector including the Seasonal Worker Programme, Pacific Labour Scheme and Horticulture Industry Labour Agreement and more which can be found here.