Food Security at Whose Expense? A Critique of the Canadian Temporary Farm Labour Migration Regime and Proposals for Change
| Author | Donald C. Cole,Janet McLaughlin,Anelyse M. Weiler |
| Date | 01 August 2017 |
| Published date | 01 August 2017 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/imig.12342 |
Food Security at Whose Expense? A Critique
of the Canadian Temporary Farm Labour
Migration Regime and Proposals for Change
Anelyse M. Weiler*, Janet McLaughlin** and Donald C. Cole***
ABSTRACT
Temporary farm labour migration schemes in Canada have been justified on the premise that
they bolster food security for Canadians by addressing agricultural labour shortages, while
tempering food insecurity in the Global South via remittances. Such appeals hinge on an ideol-
ogy defining migrants as racialized outsiders to Canada. Drawing on qualitative interviews and
participant observation in Mexico, Jamaica and Canada, we critically analyse how Canada’s
Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program is tied to ideological claims about national food secu-
rity and agrarianism, and how it purports to address migrant workers’own food insecurity.
We argue remittances only partially, temporarily mitigate food insecurity and fail to strengthen
migrant food sovereignty. Data from our clinical encounters with farm workers illustrate struc-
tural barriers to healthy food access and negative health consequences. We propose an agenda
for further research, along with policies to advance food security and food sovereignty for both
migrants and residents of Canada.
INTRODUCTION
Temporary labour migration schemes that link people from the Global South with farm jobs in the
Global North are often justified on the grounds of safeguarding global food security. Although food
insecurity is widely recognized as a driver of migration, food security concerns have been largely
ignored in debates relating to migration and development (Crush, 2013). Proponents argue that
migrant remittances alleviate unemployment, poverty and hunger in sending countries. Indeed,
some articles in this special issue have linked migration to improved food security among remit-
tance-receiving households (e.g. Thomas-Hope, this issue).However, other articles demonstrate a
more ambiguous relationship between migration and food security (Atuoye et al.; Carney; Crush &
Tawodzera, this issue).
In this article, we contribute to the collective discussion by assessing the extent to which
Canada’s temporary farm labour migration schemes, primarily the Seasonal Agricultural Worker
Program (SAWP), shape food insecurity and development in migrants’countries of origin and in
Canada. We provide preliminary insights and an agenda for future research on the intersection
between temporary farm labour migration regimes in Canada and food security. In so doing, we
build on the findings of scholars who have critiqued government-managed ‘temporary’labour
* University of Toronto
** Wilfrid Laurier University, Brantford
*** Dalla Lana School of Public Health, Toronto
doi: 10.1111/imig.12342
©2017 The Authors
International Migration ©2017 IOM
International Migration Vol. 55 (4) 2017
ISS N 00 20- 7985 Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
migration schemes, such as the SAWP, for perpetuating a policy of cheap food that undermines
livelihoods for farmers and farm workers alike, and that normalizes ‘unfree’labour migration (Prei-
bisch & Otero, 2014; Weiler et al., 2016b). This article reports on prominent claims that Canada’s
food security depends on maintaining the status quo for migrant workers. We suggest a critical
appraisal of this claim, underscoring the absence of data quantifying how much migrant workers
contribute to food produced and consumed domestically, and the prevalence of migrants in export-
oriented commodity industries. Pitting food security for Canadians against migrant rights is a false
moral choice. Our fieldwork suggests the SAWP provides migrant households with increased food
access, but at a high cost. Even if the SAWP may provide temporary improvements in food secu-
rity, it simultaneously obscures and fails to meaningfully address the structural roots of migrant
poverty. Our preliminary evidence suggests the SAWP may provide temporary improvements in
food security, but it does not ultimately strengthen food sovereignty for migrant participants.
Whereas food security typically emphasizes access to sufficient quantities of food, food sovereignty
involves the power of affected people to ensure that food-related policies are appropriate to the
social and ecological jurisdictions in which they are brought to bear (Desmarais and Wittman,
2014); in migrant workers’case, both in countries of origin and in Canada.
Beginning with a brief history of farm labour migration schemes in Canada, we sketch out domi-
nant narratives regarding national food security and major debates on the role of migrant remit-
tances in promoting ‘development’. In reviewing related data on farm worker food insecurity in the
United States, we underscore the relevance of this article to broader theoretical questions regarding
food security and food sovereignty. Next, we critically assess the justification of farm labour migra-
tion as key to Canadian food security. We examine the extent to which remittances alleviate pov-
erty in migrant sending communities and describe the barriers to healthy food access for farm
workers while in Canada. Our conclusion proposes future research directions and an agenda for
policy change toward more dignified livelihood alternatives based on farm workers’self-determina-
tion.
Our analysis is based on ethnographic fieldwork and in-depth, semi-structured interviews with
farm workers (150+), farm employers, government and industry representatives (25+), and migrant
advocates/unions (40+) conducted between 2006 and 2015 in Ontario (Weiler and McLaughlin)
and British Columbia (BC) (Weiler). In 2015, employers in these provinces hired the largest and
second-largest number of SAWP workers in Canada (ESDC, 2016). Additional sources include
three years of ethnographic fieldwork (participant observation and in-depth qualitative interviews)
with SAWP workers and their families in Canada, Mexico and Jamaica (McLaughlin), clinical data
from chart reviews of visits to the emergency department of a rural Ontario hospital (888 visits,
Norfolk General Hospital 2006-2009), and practitioner experience in providing community-based
occupational health services to migrant farm workers (2005-present, McLaughlin and Cole). While
access to culturally relevant foods may have improved in some Canadian communities since our
fieldwork began, the SAWP has changed little, perpetuating the conditions of migrant farm workers
that lead to food insecurity.
LITERATURE REVIEW
History and status of migrant farm workers in Canada
Dating back to the nineteenth century, the Canadian state has enabled international farm labour
migration initiatives considered ‘unfree’(Satzewich, 1991). Governments justified these initiatives
based on apparent labour shortages, which broadly coincided with rural-urban migration trends that
reduced the availability of local and family labour. Reid-Musson’s (2014) archival research
Food security at whose expense? 49
©2017 The Authors. International Migration ©2017 IOM
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