The next time you buy a locally grown cucumber or a jar of Alberta honey, try to picture the people who produced it for you. The first person that comes to mind may not be a migrant farm worker from Mexico, but Alberta agricultural operations are increasingly dependent on such seasonal labourers.
Canadian farms employ 60,000 temporary foreign farm workers, according to the Canadian Federation of Agriculture, representing almost one-quarter of those working in agricultural jobs in Canada. Four-fifths come from just three countries — Mexico (44.1%), Guatemala (24.1%) and Jamaica (14.8%) — according to Statistics Canada.
Maricruz Barba Gonzalez is working to give voice to this hidden population. In "From the Voices of Mexican Seasonal Farm Workers in Alberta" — her master's thesis for the University of Alberta's School of Public Health — she reports on her interviews with nine Mexican men about their well-being, including their working and living conditions, and mental and physical health.
"They are always divided. They don't feel they belong either to Mexico or to Canada, so they feel very lonely," Barba Gonzalez says. "And even though they tell you that it is a painful experience and that conditions are not fair, they feel they don't have an option, so they accept that."
"There's a lack of awareness of how much Canada is depending on migrant labour for agriculture, especially in areas that are very hands-on like vegetable field crops or greenhouses and honey production," says professor Mary Beckie, director of the school's Community Engagement Graduate Program. "They've become a major part of our workforce, but they feel very hidden."
"A modern slave"
Barba Gonzalez says a number of factors contribute to the workers' sense of isolation. Although wages for farm work are definitely higher in Canada than in Mexico, they must leave their families behind for six to eight months of each year to send those wages home.
Unlike longer-term temporary foreign workers in other industries, farm workers never become eligible to apply for permanent residency or landed immigrant status even though they may work in Canada for decades, because each work permit is less than a year long.
Long work hours, language barriers and a lack of access to personal transportation mean the workers have little contact with people in the local communities and must rely on their employers for access to health care and culturally appropriate food sources.
"Here you don't have a life because you are just dedicated to work — a modern slave," says one worker quoted in the paper.
"They told me, 'Even though we spend half our lives here in Canada, without help from employers we cannot access services such as English classes or getting a driver's licence,' things that would allow them to actually be immersed with the culture," says Barba Gonzalez.
"Their living conditions are quite variable," says Beckie, who is also editor of the journal Canadian Food Studies. "There are no standard requirements imposed by the government, so every situation is really determined by the employer."
