The New York State Farm Bureau on Tuesday said that proposed legislation on farmworker labor protections would increase labor costs by over 17 percent for New York farmers.

The Farmworkers Fair Labor Practices Act (S.2837, A.2750) would guarantee time-and-a-half overtime pay for more than 40 hours of labor, allow collective bargaining for farmworkers and provide at least one day off weekly.

According to a news release from the Farm Bureau, the overtime provision would increase labor costs for farmers by $299 million annually and that, combined with increased minimum wage provisions, the law would drop net farm income by 23 percent.

“We understand supporters of this bill mean well,” New York Farm Bureau President David Fisher was quoted as saying in the news release. “We also mean well. We greatly appreciate the contributions our farmworkers make to our farms and our food supply, but these numbers demonstrate that it will be incredibly difficult for farms to meet the proposed labor mandates.”

For some kinds of agriculture, net income would drop by even more, according to Farm Credit East, from 43 percent for vegetable growers to 101 percent for dairy farmers.

Farmworker advocates say the law institutes important worker protections that they currently lack.

Crispin Hernandez, a former worker at Marks Farms in Lowville who was fired after allegedly speaking to labor organizers about labor conditions, is one of the people working to pass the law.

“We are asking to be treated with respect, and we ask the Senate and Assembly to recognize that,” Hernandez told the Times during an interview last month.