Career Explorer Farming, fishing, forestry
Human edge, steady
Farmworkers and laborers, crop, nursery, and greenhouse
Manually plant, cultivate, and harvest vegetables, fruits, nuts, horticultural specialties, and field crops. Use hand tools, such as shovels, trowels, hoes, tampers, pruning hooks, shears, and knives. Duties may include tilling soil and applying fertilizers; transplanting, weeding, thinning, or pruning crops; applying pesticides; or cleaning, grading, sorting, packing, and loading harvested products. May construct trellises, repair fences and farm buildings, or participate in irrigation activities.
In the middle of the pack: more resilient than 59% of the 831 careers we score. AI exposure is low (the Bureau of Labor Statistics rates it low), and US jobs are projected to change by -2.4% by 2035, expected to shrink. The work leans on physical dexterity.
AI struggles with much of this work. Hiring is expected to grow slower than average, or to shrink.
- Median pay (2025)
- $35,660
- Job growth to 2035
- -2.4%
- Openings a year
- 72,500
- People doing it (2025)
- 547,000
- Usual route in
- No formal credential, then short on-the-job training
Where people already use AI for this work
- Communicate with others about operational plans or activities
- Advise others on business or operational matters
- Research biological or ecological phenomena
From Microsoft Research, Working with AI (2025).
Work AI rarely helps with
- Perform agricultural activities
- Operate agricultural or forestry equipment
- Maintain operational records
What the work looks like
- Sell and deliver plants and flowers to customers.
- Record information about crops, such as pesticide use, yields, or costs.
- Direct and monitor the work of casual and seasonal help during planting and harvesting.
- Participate in the inspection, grading, sorting, storage, and post-harvest treatment of crops.
- Harvest plants, and transplant or pot and label them.
From O*NET 31.0, US Department of Labor.
What the Bureau of Labor Statistics expects
- Fewer of these jobs, as the mechanization of agricultural operations is expected to reduce demand for these workers, with a corresponding increase in demand for agricultural equipment operators.
- Fewer of these jobs, as the expansion of Internet of Things (IoT) and IoT connected devices utilized in agricultural operations reduce the demand for manual work previously completed by farmworkers and laborers, crop, nursery, and greenhouse employees.
Careers using similar strengths, with a stronger outlook
- Insulation workers, floor, ceiling, and wallHuman edge, steady, Index 62, +2.4%
- Fiberglass laminators and fabricatorsHuman edge, growing, Index 86, +4.6%
- Semiconductor processing techniciansHuman edge, growing, Index 87, +8.2%
- Insulation workers, mechanicalHuman edge, growing, Index 61, +5.1%
Also known as: Greenhouse Worker, Grower, Harvester, Nursery Worker, Farm Laborer, Farmer, Field Irrigation Worker, Gardener.
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Sources: US Bureau of Labor Statistics Employment Projections 2025 to 2035; O*NET 31.0; Microsoft Research (2025); Anthropic Economic Index (2026); Eloundou and colleagues (Science, 2024); Felten, Raj and Seamans (2023). How we score. Updated 12 October 2026.