Thousands of
foreigners come to Finland to work as berry pickers
Helsinki (27.05.2008 - Juhani Artto) Soon thousands of
foreigners will travel to Finland to earn some money by picking berries. Most of them come
from Russia, Estonia, Poland, Ukraine and Thailand. Last year even some Mongolians
travelled to Finland to make money by berry picking.
In the last few years many effective and hard-working foreign pickers have earned in one
or two months as much as they regularly earn in twelve months in their home countries. At
the end of last season the Finnish media published reports on smiling Thais whose work
session in Finland had succeeded well.
But not all have reached the results they had expected. Two years ago the visit of tens of
Ukrainians failed badly and they had to return home without any savings from their berry
picking tour.
Strawberries at farms
Those who pick strawberries at specialised farms take, practically, no risk at all. They
come from near-by countries meaning that their travel expenses are minimal and, in
strawberry cultivation, the climate-related annual variations of the yield are not very
large. Regularly there is plenty of work for those foreigners who have been employed
either directly by
Finnish farmers or by subcontractors who sell manpower services to farms and who are, very
often, the fellow -countrymen of the pickers.
Strawberry
picking at farms is invariably piecework. The minimum working conditions are defined in
the collective agreement for agricultural work. It is of generally binding character, The
Wood and Allied Workers' Union is keen to emphasise. Also the labour legislation covering
this area must be respected.
The agreement defines that piece rate has to be at least 20 per cent higher than the
minimum time rate of EUR7.32 per hour. According to a few strawberry farmers, interviewed
by Trade Union News from Finland, experienced Estonian pickers by far exceed this minimum
piece rate. Nowadays most employees in strawberry picking are foreigners.
For Finnish schoolchildren strawberry picking is, during their summer vacation, an
alternative, and a last alternative when they do not find more attractive jobs.
Schoolchildren tend to find berry picking physically so demanding that most of them prefer
other summer jobs.
On the eve of the next season The Wood and Allied Workers' Union has published in five
foreign languages (English, Russia, Estonian, Polish and German) minimum wages and terms of minimum employment in berry
picking 2008, defined in the collective agreement for agricultural work.
Bilberries and lingonberries from forests
There is an abundance of wild berries in Finland that have high nutritional value (Finnish
forest berries). Even in the 21st century a majority of Finns are familiar with
picking wild berries although those Finns who pick wild berries with a view to retailing
may be counted only in the thousands. The government encourages people to utilise this
source of income (and vitamins, flavonoids and minerals) by not collecting tax on private
wild berry sales.
Experts estimate that private families annually pick up to 50 million kilos of wild
berries for their own consumption. That makes over a tenth of the average yield nature
annually offers us.
The amount of commercial picking of wild berries is roughly, on average, 10 million kilos
per annum. Nowadays, foreigners are responsible for a large part or provision of the
commercially picked wild berries. Commercially speaking the most important varieties are
bilberries (wild blueberry) and lingonberries (cowberry).
Most of the foreign pickers of wild berries belong to groups that have been formed in
their home countries and whose logistics, accommodation etc. are organised by the same
people who form the groups. However, pickers work as self-employed freelancers with the
added risk of not earning enough to pay their travel and other costs or at least not
making as much in savings as they had planned. Failure can be caused by badly organised
trips, such as those of tens of Ukrainians in 2006, or by a generally poor yield.
Everyman's right
In Finland our legislation allows all people, even foreigners, to walk around in the
forests and pick berries. There are certain minor restrictions to this everyman's right.
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