Migrant Farmworkers Research Poster

After reading the book Fresh Fruit, Broken Bodies for a communication course, I was curious about learning more about migrant farmworkers. I researched the topic and visualized the information for a design project. The United States has normalized the migration process and allows unauthorized workers to work in crop labor jobs at low wages with limited access to healthcare and stable living conditions.

Research Poster

User-Centered Design Concept

The second part of the project was to propose a user-centered design, I used my previous research to create an innovative educational farmers vendor market. The interaction of purchasing fruit from an educational farmers market will interest users to scan the QR code placed on the packaging design. The website linked to the QR code informs users about berry picker’s stories and asks users to donate money to improve working and living conditions.

The information provided uncovers the low wages and the demand for work. The inconsistent demand for work over the year, requires migrant workers to move across the United States to new regions. 48% of farmworkers are unauthorized workers. The migrant farmworkers are necessary to help with the high demand in agriculture work with limited US citizens wanting to work in these jobs. The H-2A Temporary Agriculture Program, also called the H-2A visa program, provides a “legal means to bring foreign-born workers to the United States to perform seasonal farm labor on a temporary basis” (USDA).

Note: The data only shows the migrant seasonal workers and do not reflect the total unauthorized migrants who have come to the United States to work in the agriculture industry every year. The names of the workers have been modified to allow the worker’s to remain anonymous.

Programs used: Adobe Illustrator, Procreate, Adobe InDesign, Adobe XD

Completed: Fall 2021