P.R. Laws tit. 5, § 322
It shall be the public policy of the Government of Puerto Rico to support, promote, develop, and strengthen the Puerto Rican agricultural industry, by means of all available and feasible mechanisms within constitutional, governmental, and economic parameters in order to create the highest number of jobs in the Island, giving priority to local workers and without excluding immigrant workers, when the local workforce is not enough to satisfy the demand for the tasks related to coffee harvesting. The objectives of this chapter shall be the following:
(a) To establish agreements between the Department of Labor and Human Resources and the Department of Agriculture to estimate the demand and availability of the local workforce for coffee harvesting per municipality on an annual basis.
(b) To guarantee the greatest possible participation of Puerto Rican workers in coffee harvesting tasks and to support the programs of different Commonwealth and Federal Government agencies, as well as those of bona fide and nonprofit entities, in order to promote job creation in agriculture, whether permanent or seasonal in nature.
(c) To provide mechanisms so that, when conditions so require, farmers may choose to hire foreign workforce for the exclusive performance of coffee harvesting tasks.
(d) To direct the Department of Labor and Human Resources to, as a public policy, authorize and approve the certificates of need for foreign workers required by federal immigration agencies for the entry of seasonal immigrant workers within a reasonable timeframe that does not affect the farmers” operations, for those agricultural businesses that, after exhausting all resources for hiring a local workforce, reveal a true need according to the local agencies” estimates. Such attempts to hire a local workforce must have proven unsuccessful, with a cap of up to half of the annual estimates regarding the need of said workforce in such farms. For example, if it is determined that, after counting the number of local workers available, such amount is still insufficient for the following year’s coffee harvest by some 5,000 coffee pickers throughout the Island, the entry of up to 2,500 foreign workers may be authorized for said year, thus complying with “up to 50% of the need.
(e) To boost the expansion of agricultural activities by reducing the uncertainty of the agricultural entrepreneur regarding workers to perform the tasks required by their enterprises, and to foster an increase in the production and quality of our products.
(f) To participate as citizens of the United States of America in all programs available under the federal regulations known as the “Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986” in an orderly, controlled, and legal manner, in order to provide our farmers with alternatives to import non-immigrant foreign agricultural workers, better known as H-2A and/or “Guest Worker”.
History —Mar. 30, 2011, No. 38, § 2.