Feds invest in ag workforce management

Jan 30, 2019

The Canadian Agricultural Human Resource Council will lead a new Quality AgriWorkforce Management Program

By Diego Flammini
Staff Writer
Farms.com

The federal government is helping Canadian farmers navigate the process of hiring and managing temporary foreign workers.

Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada is investing about $280,000 in the Canadian Agricultural Human Resource Council (CAHRC) to lead the International Phase of the Quality AgriWorkforce Management Program (QAMP).

CAHRC’s role in the program development will include creating training products, website content, webinars and workshops.

The program is designed to keep ag employers up to date on several items relating to hiring and managing temporary international employees, said Portia MacDonald-Dewhirst, executive director of CAHRC.

“It will help employers ensure that they understand the rules to access international workers so they can (utilize) the (Temporary Foreign Worker Program) in a clear and quick way and get the workers they need to fill requirements when Canadians aren’t available,” she told Farms.com. “(QAMP) also clarifies the rules when the workers are in place and what ways employers can be managing workforces.

“It also lays out best management practices to go above and beyond and ensure there’s quality in everything that everybody does around staff management practices, and it clarifies what an employer can expect during a randomized audit.”

The government will provide CAHRC with funding for about nine months.

After that time, CAHRC will add information regarding temporary foreign workers to a pre-existing toolkit on its website.

The AgriHR Toolkit provides ag employers with materials on several items from building a business plan to improving farm safety.

The Canadian ag industry included labour shortages as a key theme in the Economic Strategy Table: Agri-Food report.

Ensuring Canadian farmers have access to employees is important for industry growth.

“Canada's agricultural sector faces significant labour shortages, with over half of the work being seasonal and in rural areas with lower populations,” Jati Sidhu, MP for Mission-Matsqui-Fraser Canyon, said in a Jan. 24 statement. “Reliable access to labour is critical for this sector to ensure both continued food production and job creation.”

Video: Evolution of Beef Cattle Farming

The Clear Conversations podcast took to the road for a special episode recorded in Nashville during CattleCon, bringing listeners straight into the heart of the cattle industry. Host Tracy Sellers welcomed rancher Steve Wooten of Beatty Canyon Ranch in Colorado for a wide-ranging discussion that blended family history and sustainability, particularly as it relates to the future of beef production.

Sustainability emerged as a central theme of the conversation, a word that Wooten acknowledges can mean very different things depending on who you ask. For him, sustainability starts with the soil. Healthy soil produces healthy grass, which supports efficient cattle capable of producing year after year with minimal external inputs. It’s an approach that equally considers vegetation, animal efficiency, and long-term profitability.

That philosophy aligned naturally with Wooten’s involvement in the U.S. Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, where he served as a representative for the Colorado Cattlemen’s Association. The roundtable brings together the entire beef supply chain—from producers to retailers—along with universities, NGOs, and allied industries. Its goal is not regulation, Wooten emphasized, but collaboration, shared learning, and continuous improvement.