Farms Threatened by Labour Crunch
Canadians love the idea of farms, but the notion of actually working on one is an increasingly foreign concept.
“Right now we have an agricultural community that is shrinking and going out of business,” said Paul LeBlanc of the Apple Growers of New Brunswick. “And one of the elements that is creating a major pressure on agriculture’s ability to survive in this country is a shortage of labour.”
The situation is especially acute in the horticulture industry, and that hits Atlantic Canada especially hard, said LeBlanc.
“Labour is the single biggest cost in horticulture,” he said. “I know people who are scaling back or getting out of that sector because of a lack of labour.”
That’s a major reason why LeBlanc has become heavily involved with the newly launched Canadian Agricultural Human Resource Council. It’s known as a “sector council” – one of 32 federally funded, industry-driven organizations that work with employers, employees, educational institutions and governments to help address the human resource challenges facing Canada’s businesses.
“This is the first time where we have a national forum on this issue,” said LeBlanc. “I think we need to look beyond our regions and commodity groups, and come up with innovative ways to tap into non-traditional labour pools.
“A big part of that is going to be fighting the negative perception of farm work, and showing our young people that working in agriculture has a lot of positives.”
“The Council is focused on improving the recruitment of workers for today’s agriculture businesses – and ensuring that they stay in the agriculture sector,” said Danielle Vinette, executive director (www.cahrc-ccrha.ca). “One of our key priorities is to find innovative ways to attract young people to the business of farming by increasing the visibility of what agriculture jobs look like today.”
“We intend to talk more about the advanced technologies being used on farms and in greenhouses today – and to get this information into our schools.”
This includes providing educators with information about the many diverse career opportunities available across the agriculture sector, said Vinette. It also means working with educators to ensure that the necessary curricula and skills training programs are in place for students that choose to pursue a career in agriculture.
“Agriculture producers across Canada have told us that the difficulty attracting and retaining skilled and unskilled workers is one of their top human resource challenges,” said Vinette. “The Council is working to improve this situation over the short-term – and over the long-term.”
For LeBlanc, one of the strange things about the public’s perception of farm work is how at odds it is with how farms themselves are viewed.
“People have a romantic notion of what a family farm is,” said LeBlanc. “Urban residents are very distant from agriculture. A visit to a farm is such a novelty; it’s almost like going to a theme park.
“But agriculture is a very complex business and meeting our labour challenges is critical to making the business of farming work.”
Canadians don’t always appreciate the benefits they receive from agriculture, which produces a very high quality of food at very low prices, he said.
“There’s a perception out there that we will always have that – that we’ll always be able to fill the grocery shelves with food,” said LeBlanc. “But the most secure food supply is the domestic agriculture industry.
“In a way, it’s good that people feel so confident about our food supply that they don’t feel they have to worry about it. But even though we’re not one of those sexy new industries, we’re still the backbone of this country.”
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