Central Asians now do most of the picking on British farms.
In 2025, they received 78.5 percent of all seasonal work visas issued in the UK, up from 7.6% in 2021. In the first quarter of 2026, Central Asians again received more than three-quarters of visas. Today, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Tajikistan are the top four source countries for the temporary work program, ahead of Kenya, Moldova and all other providers.
Ukraine sent around 19,900 seasonal workers in 2021, but only 530 in 2025; Russia went from 2,276 to 11. The 2022 invasion trapped Ukraine’s men in uniform and halted Russian recruiting. British operators have turned to a region with a young, surplus workforce and dwindling destinations to send it to: Central Asia. UK-wide apps for directions increased by 23 percent in the year until March 2026.
Russia’s turn against Central Asian workers has pushed in the same direction. Since January 2025, migrants without a visa can only stay in Russia 90 days per calendar year. After the attack on Crocus Town Hall in 2024, blamed on Tajik nationals, evictions increased by 17 percent in the first half of 2025 and residence permits fell by around a third, alongside xenophobic raids recorded across the country.
Britain provides protection against this hostility, but it is very narrow. Fewer than 40,000 six-month visas a year across the region stand in the way of millions of Central Asians still working in Russia, a source of equivalent remittances. at 45 percent of GDP in the poorest states in the region. The UK visa offers no settlement, no dependents and six out of ten months of work before compulsory exit. The UK is also reducing it. The quota increased from 45,000 to 42,900 places in 2026.
Kyrgyzstan, the least populous of the four original states, has obtained 12,650 seasonal visas in 2025, twice as many as Uzbekistan, which has 6,307, although Uzbekistan has about five times the number of people. Kazakhstan has taken 5,767 and Tajikistan 5,712. Almost all of those who reach the application stage are approved, with a grant rate of around 99 percent. Therefore, the real filter lies within each country, not on the UK side.
Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan allow UK operators to hire directly; Tajikistan routes applicants to a labor ministry shortlist that has become a chokepoint for extortion allegations. Uzbekistan, for its part, is direct its work more towards Europe and the Gulf thanks to a state migrant center opening with EU support in 2025. Because operators rehire proven pickers, one of the first compounds – the one that sent the most last season sends the most the following year.
The labor migration route also leads to asylum. Asylum applications to the UK from the four Central Asian states under discussion have fallen from a few dozen in 2020 to single digits. Peak 2023 – 832 Uzbeks, 495 Tajiks, 461 Kazakhs, 233 Kyrgyz – before relaxing. Concerns about overstay are fueling discussions within the British government about toughening the program.
Britain does not absorb the exodus from Central Asia to Russia; it skims over a few tens of thousands of workers per year, regardless of which governments and recruiters move the fastest. For the moment, it is little Kyrgyzstan, and not the neighboring giants, which is in the lead. But this lead could disappear as quickly as it appeared if Moscow, Brussels or London changed course again in terms of migration policy.