Farming Myths

There is often a lot of confusion around hours worked and days counted in a week, 35 hours is regarded as the minimum needed for a full working week to be granted 7 days of work. Immigration denies there is any cut off at all, they claim that as long as the employer views the work you’re completing as full time all 7 days in a week will count. I see no reason why a 30 hour week of working 6 hours a day Monday to Friday cannot be counted as 7 days if this is the industry standard for this role. Check out the Home Affairs website where it depicts an example of someone working 30 hours a week for 6 months is granted a third year visa. If this general rule is followed the work can be completed over multiple sessions on different farms around Australia.

Quoting Gale Lalor, Acting Assistant Secretary, Immigration and Citizen Services Group.

“The department recognises that there is a range of circumstances affecting what constitutes a normal full day in each eligible industry, especially in the agricultural industries. For this reason, the policy does not prescribe the minimum hours for a normal or ‘full’ day.

As a general guide, if the employer reasonably considers that an applicant has completed a normal full day of work for that industry, then the departmental decision maker may be generally be [sic] satisfied to count that day of work toward the three months requirement.”

By far the most popular job role to obtain a second or third year visa in Australia is fruit picking, this is by no means the only job role that satisfies the specified regional work, there is just a hell of a lot of fruit that needs to be picked in Australia. Other jobs include feeding and herding cattle, construction, landscaping plus many more so check out the Home Affairs website for all the details. Be wary of geographical location as this can have an impact on whether the job is eligible or not, it has to count as a rural area, get all the details on the Home Affairs website.

If you’re lucky some jobs will come hand in hand with accommodation which will solve many of your problems, however really only the case if you’re working on smaller farms in particularly rural areas. There is a fairly large number of working hostels that offer jobs on local farms on arrival, but this is often expensive for what you’re getting, but sorts a job and place to live nonetheless. These are often situated in the areas where a large number of jobs are offered in peak seasons for fruit and vegetable related jobs.

The thing that catches a huge number of people out is thinking they can complete 88 days of farm work in 3 months, in reality this is far from the truth. This can be the case if you are extremely fortunate, however always factor in extra time to allow for travel, the job to start or unexpected days off. In some job roles such as fruit picking, significant delays can occur if fruit isn’t ripe or the weather isn’t right, so to be on the safe side get cracking with your farm work earlier than you think.

Lastly, when you secure a job you might think your 88 days are in the bag, it’s just a matter of time. Again this is definitely not true, don’t forget you are doing a job and getting paid for it by someone for which this farm work is their livelihood so will not keep you on if you perform lower than their expectations. You could end up fired before you know and then you’re back to square one looking for a job!

Always keep your wits about you when completing your 88 days, be aware of what is happening around you and always watch out for scammers!