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<p>The COVID-19 pandemic posed significant risks to the continuity of forestry operations in the southeastern United States, a region heavily dependent on seasonal H-2B guestworkers for reforestation labor. Disruptions to international travel, visa processing, and public health logistics threatened to destabilize a labor system already characterized by legal complexity and subcontracted relationships. Yet while researchers have begun to examine the vulnerabilities of migrant workers in this context, far less is known about how timber business owners, operators, and consultants responded to these disruptions. This exploratory study draws on 15 semi-structured interviews with forestry professionals in Alabama, Georgia, and North Carolina to investigate how organizations experienced and managed pandemic-related labor challenges. Grounded in organizational resilience theory and critical perspectives on subcontracted labor, the findings reveal that most businesses endured the crisis through passive resilience—maintaining operations via existing subcontractor networks and informal routines rather than structural adaptation. Health and safety measures were inconsistently applied and often delegated to visa subcontractors, and few participants acknowledged the disproportionate risks borne by H-2B workers. These results underscore the need to interrogate “resilience for whom,” as crisis responses in the forestry sector may perpetuate structural inequalities even as they sustain business continuity. This study contributes to emerging conversations about labor resilience in natural resource-dependent industries.</p>

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Pushing Through the Pandemic: Forestry Owner Perspectives on H-2B Labor and Resilience in the Southeastern US

  • 期刊论文

  • 发表日期：

    2026年3月11日

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  • Beau Brodbeck,
  • Matthew Jurjonas,
  • Wayde Morse

摘要

The COVID-19 pandemic posed significant risks to the continuity of forestry operations in the southeastern United States, a region heavily dependent on seasonal H-2B guestworkers for reforestation labor. Disruptions to international travel, visa processing, and public health logistics threatened to destabilize a labor system already characterized by legal complexity and subcontracted relationships. Yet while researchers have begun to examine the vulnerabilities of migrant workers in this context, far less is known about how timber business owners, operators, and consultants responded to these disruptions. This exploratory study draws on 15 semi-structured interviews with forestry professionals in Alabama, Georgia, and North Carolina to investigate how organizations experienced and managed pandemic-related labor challenges. Grounded in organizational resilience theory and critical perspectives on subcontracted labor, the findings reveal that most businesses endured the crisis through passive resilience—maintaining operations via existing subcontractor networks and informal routines rather than structural adaptation. Health and safety measures were inconsistently applied and often delegated to visa subcontractors, and few participants acknowledged the disproportionate risks borne by H-2B workers. These results underscore the need to interrogate “resilience for whom,” as crisis responses in the forestry sector may perpetuate structural inequalities even as they sustain business continuity. This study contributes to emerging conversations about labor resilience in natural resource-dependent industries.