Facts About Farmworkers and Colonias

What Is a "Colonia?"

A migrant farmworker is someone who works primarily in agriculture or an agriculture-related industry, like food processing. "Migrant" farmworkers move from 'home base" communities in patterns known as "migrant streams." "Seasonal" farmworkers live in communities year-round. Across the United States, migrant/famworkers face severely rundown housing, overcrowding issues, and high housing costs.

More Facts about Colonias and Migrant Farmworkers

• From 2001-2004, 29 percent of hired crop workers interviewed in the Department of Labor's National Agricultural Workers Survey (NAWS) had family incomes that were below the federal poverty level.
• Colonias residents have an average income of $5,000/year. The vast majority of U.S. counties that have been poor for four decades or more are in the Texas border region.
• The border region saw a rapid 22% growth in the 1990s.
• The colonia crowding rate is four times the national average.
• 85% of Colonias residents are U.S. citizens; 97% are Hispanic.
• Farmworkers brave extreme weather conditions and exposure to chemicals in their work.·
• 33% of farmworkers live in moderate to severely substandard housing
• About 33% of farmworkers pay more than 1/3 of their income for housing.
• Areas in the US with the most serious farmworker housing problems" are Florida and the Northwest.
• The 52% crowding rate for farmworkers is 10 times the national average.
• 88% of farmworkers are estimated to be Hispanic; 45% have children.