Introduction
Paths to Residency
Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program
Legislative Background and Characteristics
Live-In Caregiver Program
Recent Changes
Pilot Project for Occupations Requiring Lower Levels of Formal Training
Legislative Background and Characteristics
IOM’s Guatemalan Temporary Agricultural Workers to Canada
The Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP) is Canada’s primary policy instrument to place migrant workers in temporary employment. It has four streams,5 three of which relate to lower wageworkers. Those three are: the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (SAWP), the Live-in Caregiver Program (LCP) and the Pilot Project for Occupations Requiring Lower Levels of Formal Training (National Occupational Certification (NOC) C and D) (the Pilot Project).6 The others, with slight exceptions for the LCP and Pilot Project, often necessitated “forced rotation,” since the terms of the visa-holders’ agreements require them to return to their country of origin. Click here for more information on acquiring residency in Canada as a low-skill temporary worker.
SAWP, which originated in 1967, is a government to government program structured through bilateral Memorandum of Understandings between Mexico and various Caribbean countries and Canada. The program is largely facilitated through a private sector organization in Canada called FARMS. The government division Human Resources and Development Canada (HRSDC) vested this organization with the responsibility of reviewing Labor Market Opinion applications, which potential employers must obtain to prove that hiring foreign workers will not adversely affect the employment for Canadian citizens. The work visas last up to eight months, and several rules govern the host company’s treatment of workers. The sending governments orchestrate recruitment. Notably, consular officials from the sending countries are required to be available to SAWP visa-holders. Workers on the SAWP are not permitted the opportunity to apply for permanent residency. Click here for more information.
The majority of low skill temporary workers in Canada migrate under the LCP, formerly known as the Foreign Domestic Movement. The program is unique among the TFWPs in that it does have the potential to lay a foundation for permanent residence: the workers, the overwhelming majority of whom are from the Philippines, may transfer to permanent status if, up to four years from the date of their arrival in Canada, they have worked at least 24 months, or have been fully employed 3900 hours within a minimum of 22 months (with a maximum of 390 hours of overtime).15 Potential employers are required to apply for an LMO.16 The LCP is also unique given that workers are required to live with their employers, a provision criticized by the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW).17 Further information, including descriptions of recent changes to the program, can be located here.
The Pilot Project represents the Canadian government’s effort to expand labor market flexibility to sectors outside of agriculture; though in recent years it has become more common for food production firms to utilize it (click here for a statistical analysis). A business-initiated program, the Pilot Project is not founded on MOUs, but on employer demand for labor. Government protections are harder to secure, as there are no requirements that diplomatic representatives be situated near the workers, nor that any consular inspections of their treatment be made.
The work permit extends 24 months, and subsequent applications for admission into the pilot project “cannot be refused solely because a TFW: has already worked in Canada for 24 months; or has not returned home for a minimum period of four months.”19 This change, which took effect in May 2009, helps to reduce forced rotation, as a worker is able to “extend” their permit by simply reapplying. Click here for more information on legislative background and characteristics.
The Guatemalan Temporary Agricultural Workers to Canada program (GTAWC) was initiated under the auspices of the Pilot Project in 2003. This particular sub-program is important because the recruiter is International Organization on Migration (IOM), a government membership organization based in Geneva,).
As mentioned above, the government division Human Resources and Development Canada (HRSDC) outsourced the responsibility of reviewing LMO applications to FARMS (or, under its French Canadian acronym, FERME) in 1987. After the Pilot Project was introduced in 2002, FERME in Quebec approached the Guatemalan government, which had been lobbying for an opportunity to export temporary labor to Canada for many years, and drew up an MOU to facilitate the application of the Pilot Project.29 The MOU provides that an intergovernmental organization, the IOM, in conjunction with the Guatemalan Ministries of Foreign Affairs and of Labour and Social Affairs,30 recruit workers “in the field” according to the needs of Pilot Project LMOs processed in Quebec by FARMS. This program began in 2003 with 215 workers in Quebec; it has since facilitated the employment of 14,000 temporary workers in Quebec, Alberta, Ontario and British Columbia.31
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