Was an issue in Germany:
https://m.dw.com/en/seasonal-workers-flock-to-germany-for-as...
As with many labour-intensive crops, people want to eat it, but not do the work involved themselves.
One issue that I foresee is that if something needs a very specialized robot, then the market might not be big enough to warrant the development cost. Undoubtedly it makes lot of sense to automate something like wheat or whatnot bulk crop because there is just tons of that around. But asparagus or something might be too niche?
Ah, yes. The best asparagus is hand-picked the day of consumption, and it would be ideal if picked by the people eating it. I grew up in an area that used to have asparagus fields, so asparagus grew "wild" along the fences and ditchbanks. I would occasionally help my parents cut the day's wild asparagus for dinner. I hated it as a kid, but really grew to appreciate how good fresh asparagus is when compared to what has to be mass produced and shipped, because, as you say, nobody wants to do the labor.
1) desire to eat « fresh » foods out-of-season (greenhouses, air transport, lengthy controlled-atmosphere storage)
2) feeding food to food and getting 1/10th back (feeding corn to a cow)
3) desire for labour-intensive foods. Potatoes can be straightforward harvested from a field by a machine. Alfalfa (or anything in a greenhouse) cannot.
I think the biggest barrier to going back to « the old way » is not having manufactured fertilizer. Nobody cares if the water came by pump instead of by hand. But I supposed over-watered at the end = more water in the product instead of useful matter.