Stephanie Ramirez says she labored 15-hour shifts and drank as much as three Monster Vitality drinks a day to maintain herself going. Till someday, her physique gave out and he or she collapsed on the job.
Ramirez is a Guatemalan farm employee whose story Canadians may not ordinarily hear. However CBC Information has realized she is considered one of 5 employees who had been collectively awarded almost $80,000 in a B.C. Employment Requirements Department determination involving a Fraser Valley employer.
But when the federal division that oversees the short-term overseas employee program performed an investigation into the employees’ complaints, it discovered no issues and gave the identical employer a clear audit.
“Very often, these sorts of issues simply get swept beneath the rug,” stated Jenna Hennebry, a professor on the Balsillie College of Worldwide Affairs and Worldwide Migration Analysis Centre at Wilfrid Laurier College in Waterloo, Ont.
“This.… is one of some circumstances which have produced outcomes for employees. However it’s nonetheless an indication that issues usually are not working.”
The B.C. choices, issued in January 2025, consult with occasions that occurred at Abbotsford-based Sahota Farms, Valley Choose Meals and Triple S Greenhouses — which the Employment Requirements Department thought of to be a single employer — within the spring and summer season of 2021.
The B.C. investigation discovered the businesses underpaid the employees with respect to wages, additional time and trip pay, and misrepresented the roles of a few of the employees to the federal authorities.
In some circumstances, the B.C. determination discovered the corporate misrepresented the size of employment, terminating employees with out discover months earlier than their contracts had been up. Employees similar to Ramirez had been additionally required to often work 15- to 17-hour shifts, for a number of days at a time.
Two former B.C. farm employees are talking out concerning the office situations they skilled, which led them to file an official grievance. Although a federal investigation discovered no issues, B.C.’s Employment Requirements Department awarded 5 employees almost $80,000.
Muller Ojeda, the human sources consultant for Triple S Greenhouses — which he says is a separate authorized and operational entity from Sahota Farms and Valley Choose Meals — stated the businesses handed a federal audit in June 2023.
“We acknowledge the choices made by the (B.C.) Employment Requirements Department and are presently reviewing the findings intimately. We reserve the fitting to enchantment in opposition to the choice,” he stated in an emailed assertion.
Three of the employees concerned within the determination agreed to talk to CBC Information. They stated Service Canada by no means interviewed them about their experiences working within the Fraser Valley.
‘A greater life’
Daniel Concha-Hernandez labored on farms all his life in Chile and earned a level in agronomic engineering. He jumped on the likelihood to work in Canada.
“I go away my job [in Chile] as a result of I feel right here I’ve a very good alternative, a greater job, a greater home, a greater life,” he stated in an interview with CBC.
He got here to Canada in June 2021 together with his associate, Francisca Reyes. Each had presents of employment with Sahota Farms. Virtually instantly, nevertheless, the couple observed one thing was off.
They’d been employed to do high quality management work. Based on the Employment Requirements determination, that included grading produce based mostly on its measurement and weight; placing it by way of steel detectors and X-ray machines; making ready and administering chemical substances to scrub the produce; and reporting on the amount and high quality of the fruit processed. Each Concha-Hernandez and Reyes have skilled experience on this space.
Nonetheless, after they obtained their contracts, Concha-Hernandez and Reyes did not perceive why their jobs had been described as farm employees, primarily involved with subject work similar to weeding, pruning, irrigation and harvesting.
Their Labour Market Influence Assessments — the federal authorization required by employers who rent overseas employees — equally described their jobs as farm employees.
The excellence is essential, as a result of B.C. regulation doesn’t require employers to pay farm employees additional time or statutory vacation pay. The speed of pay for high quality management employees can also be sometimes greater than that of farm employees.
When Concha-Hernandez and Reyes arrived at their farm lodging, Reyes described it as “horrible.”
“The home the place we stay there was very soiled, in very poor situation. I keep in mind that my mattress was soiled. The sheets [were] soiled, too,” she recalled. “It was wanting like somebody was sleeping there earlier than I arrived.”
Reyes additionally stated nobody instructed them that meals scraps had been speculated to be separated from rubbish. All the rubbish from her lodging and the close by home the place the Mexican employees lived went into one huge bin, which she says was not emptied in the course of the months she was there. In consequence, she says her lodging was infested with rats.
“The scent was horrible,” she stated.
Ojeda didn’t reply a query concerning the employees’ lodging, however pointed to the clear audit from Service Canada.
Service Canada launched the audit in November 2021, in response to correspondence obtained by CBC. This was two months after Concha-Hernandez and Reyes had been let go.
As a part of the audit, the employers submitted studies from inspections performed by the Western Agriculture Labour Initiative, which represents farm employers, exhibiting the housing met all criteria. The studies had been dated December 2020 and January 2021 — months earlier than the employees in query arrived.
This sort of timeframe is typical as a result of the federal authorities requires a housing inspection to ensure that an employer to get permission to rent a overseas employee, Hennebry, the Wilfred Laurier professor, says.
“As soon as employees arrive, the place that was proven to be for 4 employees to stay in all of the sudden has 20 in it,” she stated, including that there’s hardly ever any follow-up.
“The housing rules across the short-term overseas employee program because it stands now, they’re extraordinarily imprecise. They are saying issues like ‘ample,’ however no standards for what that appears like. And the norm is overcrowded, not clear, not non-public, not safe.”
Employment and Social Growth Canada declined an interview request, however famous in a written assertion that the institution and enforcement of lodging requirements is normally completed by provinces. Inspections may very well be performed by provincial or municipal officers, or non-public contractors, relying on the jurisdiction.
Concha-Hernandez and Reyes began work for the farm in June 2021, and regardless of the “farm employee” designation, they labored within the high quality management roles they’d been employed for. The work was completed in two Abbotsford processing crops, which typically meant being within the frozen meals space in sub-zero temperatures.
Concha-Hernandez and Reyes stated they instructed their employers they weren’t pleased with their wages and dealing situations.
Their contracts acknowledged they’d have eight months of labor — till roughly the top of January. However Concha-Hernandez says that in mid-September, he, Reyes and three others had been instructed there was no extra work and that they’d be going again to Chile in a matter of days.
The corporate stated this was as a result of the time interval coincides with the top of the rising season and subsequently a slowdown in work, in response to the Employment Requirements Department determination.
That was when Concha-Hernandez contacted Dignidad Migrante, a migrant employee advocacy group based mostly in Surrey, B.C., on the time.
Reyes stated she and the opposite employees weren’t positive if what they skilled was per labour legal guidelines till they contacted Dignidad.
“When you consider Canada, you assume it is a First World nation, so you do not assume that you will … expertise that,” she stated. “So when Daniel was in touch with Dignidad Migrante, after which he defined all the principles … we needed to do one thing.”
Dignidad’s Raul Gatica helped them get open work permits, permitting them to remain in Canada working for different employers, and file complaints with Service Canada, WorkSafeBC and B.C. Employment Requirements.
‘My physique could not face up to any extra’
Ramirez, from Guatemala, was 21 when she got here to B.C. within the spring of 2021 on a contract with Triple S Greenhouses.
When she arrived at her Abbotsford lodging, Ramirez stated she was shocked to seek out she can be sharing a room with 25 different girls. The home additionally lacked fundamental family provides, similar to pans, utensils and small home equipment, which Ramirez stated she needed to buy herself.
Video submitted by Stephanie Ramirez exhibits dwelling situations of Guatemalan employees.
Triple S spokesman Ojeda stated the occupancy of the residence was beneath the utmost set by the province.
The B.C. Employment Requirements grievance discovered no proof the employers had misrepresented housing situations to Ramirez.
In contrast to Concha-Hernandez and Reyes, Ramirez picked fruit and beans and in addition separated out dangerous fruit, assembled packing containers and labored within the frozen meals space within the processing plant. She typically did harvesting and processing on the identical day, transferring from one facility to a different, which she instructed B.C. investigators resulted in very lengthy days.
In an interview with CBC performed in Spanish by way of a translator, Ramirez stated that in observe, this meant working from 5 or 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily. She additionally had family chores to do when she obtained residence. Ramirez stated she consumed two or three Monster Vitality drinks a day. Sooner or later, she collapsed whereas assembling packing containers, foaming on the mouth.
“My physique could not face up to any extra as a result of I wasn’t consuming nicely, as a result of they did not go away us time,” she stated in Spanish.
A co-worker ended up bringing her to the emergency division.
In her Employment Requirements grievance, Ramirez stated her employers instructed her the hospital go to had price $700 and was not lined by insurance coverage, which meant she needed to pay the cash again. As a result of she couldn’t produce a receipt, the quantity was not included in her Employment Requirements award.
Ojeda, the human sources consultant for Triple S Greenhouses, didn’t reply to a query about whether or not the corporate had required Ramirez to pay the cash again.
Ramirez ought to have had both provincial or non-public well being protection beneath the short-term overseas employee program, Hennebry says. “Legally talking, employees ought to by no means need to pay out of pocket to entry well being care.”
Ramirez stated she left the farm in July 2021, with the assistance of Dignidad Migrante.
‘Go to the farm and examine’
Service Canada’s audit, which was concluded in June 2023, discovered Sahota Farms totally in compliance with the Immigration and Refugee Safety Rules, Ojeda stated.
“This included an intensive examination of the identical complaints the Momentary International Employees referenced within the Employment Requirements determination. Service Canada has discovered our group to be compliant throughout key areas, together with wages, occupational duties, working situations, lodging, and guaranteeing a protected and abuse-free office.
“Moreover, we now have constantly handed all housing inspections and prior integrity audits with none points.”
Concha-Hernandez says he cannot perceive how Service Canada got here to that conclusion, particularly with out interviewing the employees concerned.
“Nobody from Service Canada referred to as us, by no means,” he stated. “They are saying the home situation and the work situation had been actually good for the employee, however we all know that’s false, that it isn’t true.”
It’s unclear whether or not anybody from Service Canada even visited the farm over the course of this inspection. Employment and Social Growth Canada, which oversees Service Canada, instructed CBC in a written assertion it couldn’t reply questions on compliance actions as a result of privateness and program integrity concerns.
Nearly all of Service Canada’s 2,122 inspections associated to the short-term overseas employee program in 2023-24 had been performed off-site, the ESDC assertion stated. Even after they had been on-site, the employer was normally knowledgeable prematurely.
Of the 650 on-site inspections in 2023-24, the employer was given advance discover in a majority of circumstances (460), the assertion stated.
Having inspectors present up extra typically, unannounced, is one thing that will assist susceptible employees, Reyes says.
“Go to the farm and examine — [don’t send] a letter for the employer prematurely of that. Simply seem within the firm and examine if every part is OK for the employees, or within the homes.”
‘Creates situations for exploitation’
A yr and a half after Service Canada’s audit, B.C.’s Employment Requirements Department — which did interview the employees — got here to a special conclusion.
Concha-Hernandez, Reyes and two of their Chilean co-workers didn’t meet the B.C. definition of farm employee, the choice stated, and as such had been entitled to additional time, trip and statutory vacation pay. And whereas B.C. investigators discovered no proof the employers misrepresented the positions or the wages to the employees themselves, they famous the job descriptions used to use for federal permission to rent overseas employees had been inaccurate.
Ojeda stated the job descriptions listed for the Chileans used 2019 nationwide occupation classifications, which had been modified the next yr, after their submission.
In ruling that the businesses misrepresented the size of employment, Employment Requirements awarded Concha-Hernandez and Reyes what they’d have earned had they been employed till the top of their contracts in January 2022. As a result of Ramirez didn’t present a duplicate of her employment settlement, there was no document of the size of her contract.
The businesses had been collectively fined $500 for every of the six violations of the B.C. Employment Requirements Act.
The businesses stay eligible to use for the short-term overseas employee program, the ESDC assertion stated, including that the division would consider future functions “in opposition to necessary standards, together with previous non-compliance with federal or provincial legal guidelines that regulate employment or recruitment of staff.”
The truth that these corporations can nonetheless apply to herald overseas employees is proof the system is damaged, Hennebry stated.
“I feel that this case factors to the continued longstanding set of challenges we now have with a program that’s designed to herald folks to work in a short lived context and who shouldn’t have the identical stage of entry to safety of their rights,” she stated.
She added that beneath the short-term overseas employee program, employees’ residency in Canada is commonly contingent upon them working for one employer.
“It creates situations for exploitation, for abuse and for well being dangers which are completely not acceptable.”
Canada’s short-term overseas employee program has been criticized by teams similar to Amnesty Worldwide for facilitating widespread and systematic abuse of migrant employees. A January 2025 report noted “most are unable to entry efficient cures for the abuses they endured.”
Ramirez has since discovered work as a cleaner and utilized to remain in Canada as a refugee. Concha-Hernandez discovered work as a landscaper whereas Reyes stays at residence to care for his or her son, who was born in 2023. They’re additionally hoping to remain in Canada.
The three employees are sharing their tales as a result of they need future migrants to find out about their rights in Canada, Reyes says.
“This time, we go away this example — however we needed to assume additionally concerning the individuals who come after us.”
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