Ron Friesen has grown vegetables for 55 years and understands the value of Mexican labourers.
“The only reason that we’re still in business … is because we have Mexican staff,” said Friesen, who owns and operates Dunvegan Gardens in Fairview, Alta.
He has employed Mexican labourers for the last 34 years at his operation, which includes a market garden, greenhouses and enough strawberry plants to make him the second largest grower in Alberta. Friesen considers himself fortunate because his workers arrived before H1N1 hit Mexico.
“We start early enough. Our (11 workers) have already been here two months,” said Friesen, who has sons that run market gardens and greenhouses in Edmonton and Fort McMurray, Alta.
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This summer 15,000 to 20,000 Mexicans are expected to work on farms in Canada, said Joe Sardinha, president of the B.C. Fruit Growers Association. The H1N1 outbreak has led to more stringent protocols for Mexicans in the Seasonal Agriculture Worker Program, a Human Resources and Skills Development Canada initiative to match workers and Canadian employers. Potential workers are now pre-screened in Mexico for H1N1.
“They have to undergo a questionnaire in Mexico City and they’re also tested by two doctors before they are allowed to come,” he said.
Sardinha said if H1N1 widens into a larger crisis, it could become a problem for growers later in June, when the apple crops need hand thinning and the cherry harvest begins.
Todd Giffin, co-owner of Mayfair Farm in Portage la Prairie, Man., said his Mexican labourers arrived a few weeks ago.
“It was a worry for us, because we didn’t know for sure till they got here that they were coming,” said Giffin, president of the Vegetable Growers Association of Manitoba.
Workers at Mayfair Farms were transplanting cauliflower last week, said Giffin, who believes H1N1 has been blown out of proportion.
