Bermuda’s wholesalers may be forced to navigate a United States market with declines in produce, as farms face growing concern over yield.

As much as 95 per cent of Bermuda’s food supply is imported, including a large amount of fresh foodstuffs such as meats, sea food, fruits and vegetables. The lion’s share of imports are from the US.

There have been no import shortages so far, but issues such as climate change, rising costs and tightening margins have been faced by growers, including labour shortages that have become acute in recent years.

American farmers are facing a critical shortage of migrant workers primarily driven by increased immigration enforcement and deportation of undocumented workers.

Expanded raids and stricter enforcement have significantly depleted the undocumented workforce, reducing the total US agricultural workforce by over 150,000 workers between March and July last year alone.

The agricultural sector is heavily dependent on this demographic, with immigrants, including illegal immigrants, making up as much as 70 per cent of the total workforce.

The shortage has lead to widespread concerns regarding unharvested crops and a national rise in future food prices.

Major importer BGA is monitoring developments, but Aaron Bloom, the company’s chief operating officer, said there is a resiliency to the food supply in which he has confidence.

He believes Bermuda’s importers will always find a way to get food on the island and do their best in the face of rising costs.

Mr Bloom said: “A lot of our business stems from primarily the northeastern region of the US — 70 to 80 per cent, even a little bit higher. It just depends on the type of category.”

He said with growing regions throughout the US there is opportunity to supplement product categories from elsewhere, when there are shortages from the traditional buying regions. There are also other countries.

But the challenges do impact margins.

He said: “This is a tight game. We are an island with a net sum game. Everyone is playing in the same arena here. But this is the business we are in and we are very good at what we do. We don’t have a problem reducing those margins to where we need to be, to bring value to our end users.”

He said they are happy to participate in the government’s tariff reduction programme and pass on all the savings to the consumer. In May, the government added to the list of items for which duty relief is now available.

But he said there is no secret that costs for the products are rising and so are supply chain costs.

He noted: “There is supply and demand that pushes invariably prices upwards almost every single time.”

But he added: “We take our social economic responsibilities very seriously here on the island and despite these upward pressures on pricing, we do take forward positions on contacts with our suppliers and do commit to volume at a certain price so that we can maintain not only continuity of supply, but also continuity in terms of keeping pricing as low as possible.”

He believes that technology will help resolve some of the issues with labour shortages on the farms, although much of that is yet to be realised.