United States tapping skilled South Africans for the deadliest job in America – paying R62,700 a month
America’s most dangerous job is attracting thousands of skilled South Africans, with agricultural workers earning an average of R62,700 a month while filling critical labour shortages on US farms.
A July 2026 report by Steven M. Sweat, Personal Injury Lawyers in the United States, found that agricultural workers face the highest workplace fatality risk of any occupation in the United States.
The study analysed five years of fatal workplace injury data, comparing the number of deaths, fatality rates per 100,000 workers, and average annual wages across high-risk professions.
The findings showed that agricultural workers face by far the greatest risk, recording 725 fatal workplace injuries over five years and a fatal injury rate of 2,401 per 100,000 workers
According to the study, this equates to more than one in every 50 workers dying on the job.
The report also showed that the average annual wage for agricultural workers is $45,600, or roughly R752,700, which translates to about R62,700 a month.
The report noted that pay remains well below the average American salary despite the significant risks of the profession.
Motor vehicle operators ranked as the second most dangerous occupation, recording 5,342 fatal workplace injuries over the same period and a fatal injury rate of 2,089 per 100,000 workers.
Grounds maintenance workers, material moving workers, and extraction workers rounded up the top five.
Air transportation workers, fishing and hunting workers, construction trades workers, farming, fishing and forestry occupations, and heavy truck drivers rounded out the top ten.
While heavy and tractor-trailer truck drivers earned the highest average salary among the occupations listed at $55,900 (R921,000) annually, agricultural work remained the deadliest profession overall.
The sector has become an important source of employment for South Africans through the United States’ H-2A temporary agricultural worker visa programme.
According to the US Department of State visa statistics, South Africa is the world’s second-largest source of H-2A agricultural guest workers after Mexico.
US consulates in Johannesburg, Cape Town and Durban issue between 14,500 and 15,200 H-2A visas to South African agricultural workers each year.
Hiring of South Africans has sparked an uproar in parts of the United States
South Africans have also established a strong reputation in mechanised agriculture. Mexican workers account for the overwhelming majority of manual crop-picking jobs.
However, South Africans make up a disproportionately large share of heavy machinery operators, combine harvester drivers and custom harvesters working across America’s Great Plains and Midwest.
US Department of Labour job certifications show that American employers have a significant demand for South African workers because of their English proficiency, heavy vehicle licences, and experience operating large-scale agricultural equipment.
This includes machinery from manufacturers such as John Deere and Case IH. However, the growing reliance on South African workers has sparked legal disputes in parts of the United States.
Speaking to CapeTalk, Rob McDuff, Director of Impact Litigation at the Mississippi Centre for Justice, said the latest lawsuit against a Mississippi farming operation forms part of a broader challenge to alleged abuses of the H-2A visa system.
“This is actually the ninth lawsuit we have filed over the past five years at the Mississippi Centre for Justice, along with our friends at Southern Migrant Legal Services,” McDuff said.
“These lawsuits are against farm operations in the Mississippi Delta for abusing the foreign agricultural worker visa programme.”
The latest case was brought on behalf of five Mississippi farm workers, who allege they were treated less favourably than white South Africans employed under the H-2A programme.
McDuff claimed employers had been bringing in South Africans while paying them higher wages, allocating more working hours and providing greater earning opportunities than local workers.
He alleged that some employers falsely certify that they cannot find enough American workers to fill vacancies.
“The way they do this is by falsely claiming, in order to comply with American law, that they have looked for local workers and cannot find enough to fill the jobs,” McDuff said.
He added that US labour laws require local employees working alongside H-2A workers to receive the same wages, but alleged this requirement is frequently ignored.
“American law requires that they be paid a certain level if they are foreign workers coming into the visa programme,” McDuff said.
“So they have been paid that rate, but the local workers are still kept at lower wages, even though the law requires they’d be paid the same as the foreign workers.”
McDuff described the issue as a “systemic problem”, particularly in the Mississippi Delta, where many farms depend heavily on seasonal labour.
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