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The report examines employers’ attitudes and strategies on the employment of migrant workers in the F2F supply chain, focusing on agriculture, food processing, and catering/restaurants. Drawing on a 2025 survey of 300 small and medium enterprises, focus groups with sectoral stakeholders, and analysis of existing data, the research analyses how employer strategies shape formal and informal employment patterns and migrant workers’ vulnerabilities. The fi ndings reveal migrant workers’ structural role in these sectors: 84.9% of agricultural companies, 86.1% of restaurants, and 67% of food processing fi rms employ foreign workers, with 94.9% concentrated in unskilled manual positions. Agriculture (81.4% male) and food processing (78.8% male) are male-dominated, while the largest migrant groups are Moroccan, Bangladeshi, and Pakistani workers, refl ecting recently established (2015-2025) migration networks. Employers’ hiring decisions refl ect both supply-driven constraints (particularly severe labor shortages as Italian workers tend to reject seasonal jobs and deteriorating working conditions) and demand-driven motivations emphasizing fl exibility and cost reduction. Recruitment occurs predominantly through informal channels, with formal systems (public employment centers, Flows Decree quotas) proving too slow and bureaucratic, particularly for seasonal agricultural needs. Stakeholders, even though representing different interests, agreed that coordinated regulatory reforms are needed: they should address multiple factors producing migrant vulnerability to exploitation, from immigration law (delinking residence and integration from formal employment), to labour law (improving statutory minimums and contract stabilisation), to fi scal policy and enforcement (promoting systematic inspection, supply chain accountability).