Defra Seasonal workers survey results 2023
22 Oct 2024
This Defra document provides a summary of results from a survey of workers who were issued Seasonal Worker visas during 2023.
The purpose of the survey is to gain insights into their experience to understand what went well and where improvements may be needed. The survey was conducted between 4 February and 31 March 2024.
In line with our commitment to continual improvement, the survey questions were updated in 2023 in partnership with industry and NGO stakeholders. Whilst maintaining comparability with previous surveys as much as possible, the 2023 survey questions incorporated an increased focus on workers’ on-farm experience and finances. In addition, to increase response rates, the survey was conducted 4 months earlier than in previous years, meaning their experiences were fresher in workers’ memories.
The 2023 survey succeeded in securing a much greater response rate. Overall, there were 13,911 responses to the survey, a 42.5% return rate (in 2022 the response rate was 12.4%).
The vast majority of survey respondents were from 4 central Asian countries, with Kyrgyzstan having the greatest representation (33.4% of all respondents).