As much of this year's production of strawberries will be picked by non-EU workers, growers have been warned that they could not pass on such workers to other farmers where work was available.
Ms Ann McCrudden, Dalmac Recruitment, Rush, whose company arranges contracts for non-EU workers in Ireland, told the Teagasc soft fruit conference in Croke Park that the workers were not allowed to "job hop".
When applying for a permit the employer had to undertake to guarantee work for the foreign worker for a specified period and non-EU workers could work only for the employer whose name was on the permit, she said.
Ms McCrudden stressed that the workers her company were bringing to Ireland were not refugees. Many were well educated, with multiple skills, but were suffering from high unemployment and low wages in their home countries.
"Many of these workers are forced to borrow money at exorbitant interest rates from moneylenders in order to pay their travel costs here," she said.
"Hardly any have held a bank account and, in fact, they have little trust in financial institutions since in their home countries these tend to go into liquidation every second day." Mr Michael Condon, director of the Kildalton Horticultural College, Piltown, Co Kilkenny, said foreign labour had been vital in the huge expansion of strawberry production in this State. New production systems and new strains of strawberry have led to an increase of over 10 per cent per year in consumer demand for Irish-grown strawberries.
Farmers could now produce strawberries from April to November compared to the traditional three-week system under outdoor production, he said.
Mr Conlon said that strawberries now accounted for about 75 per cent of the £12 million annual soft fruit output.