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    4. COVID-19 Disruptions and Agriculture: Temporary Foreign Workers

Logo StatCan COVID-19: Data to Insights for a Better Canada COVID-19
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Logo StatCan COVID-19: Data to Insights for a Better Canada COVID-19
Disruptions and Agriculture: Temporary Foreign Workers

   Release date: April 17, 2020
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     * Canada’s agriculture sector is a significant source and contributor
       to the food supply chain in Canada.
     * The agriculture sector is highly dependent on temporary foreign
       workers (TFW’s).  TFW’s account for 20% of total employment in this
       sector, with a particularly high dependency in the horticulture
       industry (e.g. fruits, vegetables, greenhouse and nursery
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       operations).
     * Border restrictions due to COVID-19 could have an impact on the
       availability of temporary foreign workers during the 2020 growing
       season, with this decrease in labour potentially impacting Canada’s
       domestic food production.
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       domestic food production.

Agriculture and Temporary Foreign Workers

   Canada’s agriculture industry is a significant source and contributor
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   in the spring, and harvesting in the summer and fall.

   This sector is particularly dependent on the Temporary Foreign Worker
   Program and the Seasonal Agricultural Workers Program.  In the context
   of COVID-19, border restrictions are heightening vulnerabilities
   related to accessing this workforce and could put Canada’s domestic
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   food production, especially horticulture crops, at risk.

   Temporary Foreign Workers are critical to the agriculture sector and
   have been steadily increasing in Canada over the past twenty years.  In
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   have been steadily increasing in Canada over the past twenty years.  In
   2018, there were nearly 55,000 jobs filled by temporary foreign workers
   in Canada’s agriculture industry and these accounted for 20 per cent of
   total employment in the primary agriculture sector.  Although,
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   in Canada’s agriculture industry and these accounted for 20 per cent of
   total employment in the primary agriculture sector.  Although,
   temporary foreign workers in 2018 came from nearly 100 countries, the
   majority came from Mexico (51%); Guatemala (20%) and Jamaica (18%).

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   Note 1
          Proportion of temporary foreign workers in 2018 was compared to
          the total number of agriculture employees from the 2016 Census
          of Agriculture. The 2018 estimates for the total number of
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          Return to note 1 referrer

   Source: Statistics Canada (2020). Temporary Foreign Workers File, 2018.
   Excludes Territories.

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   CAPTION: Table 2
   Jobs filled by TFWs in the agriculture sector, and farms with at least
   one temporary foreign worker, by province, 2018
   Table summary
   This table displays the results of Jobs filled by TFWs in the
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   Note 1
          Proportion of temporary foreign workers in 2018 was compared to
          the total number of agriculture employees from the 2016 Census
          of Agriculture. The 2018 estimates for the total number of
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          Return to note 1 referrer

   Source: Statistics Canada (2020). Temporary Foreign Workers File, 2018.
   Excludes Territories.

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   Farm income, 2018 (revised data)

   Agricultural sector workers from the Temporary Foreign Workers Program,
   2016, 2017 and 2018

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   2016, 2017 and 2018

   Agricultural sector workers from the Temporary Foreign Workers Program,
   2015