Morocco’s thousands of seasonal workers in Spain to become jobless by June

At least 7,000 Moroccan seasonal workers hired to pick fruits in the Huelva region (southern Spain) will lose their jobs by June. These workers will be added to the 31,800 Moroccans stranded abroad since the closure of borders due to the coronavirus, EFE reports.

Quoting sources involved in the recruitment of these seasonal workers, the Spanish news agency explains that 3,000 of these women will lose their jobs by the first week of June while the others will gradually find themselves in the same conditions by the end of the harvest season.

Entrepreneurs in the Huelva region have already expressed their concern about the fate of these seasonal workers after the end of the season, without knowing who should take care of them if their stay is prolonged in fields where there is no more strawberries or raspberries to harvest.

The circumstances caused this year by the closing of the borders have in a way benefited the Moroccan seasonal workers who were in Spain before mid-March. They thus saw their contracts extended by several months, which allowed them to fill the staffing gaps left by their colleagues who could not join the campaign.

This year, 16,500 temporary workers were selected to go to Spain, but the constant flows of departures (three ships per week from Tangier to Algeciras) was abruptly interrupted on March 13, hence only 7,000 of them were able to join Spain.

For the record, Morocco authorized around 90,000 people to leave its territory on repatriation flights and exceptional ferries, without repatriating its nationals stranded abroad.