Mexicans working in the Edmonton area for up to 8 months a year mourn the loss of their family life
John Ulan
When Manuel Vargas returned home from his job as a migrant farm worker last fall, his 14-year-old- daughter finally expressed her sorrow at his long annual absences. She would rather ride a bicycle than ride in a car, she told him, if it meant he no longer left their home in ElSalto, Mexico, to work in Canada.
Now at the end of his fifth year as a migrant farm worker in Canada, Vargas sits on a wicker-backed chair in the spotless kitchen he shares with the three other men who work with him at Riverbend Gardens in northeast Edmonton. He smiles and tells Sergio Manrique, who is acting
as a translator, that it must be a father-daughter thing. His sons are not nearly as expressive. But still, he feels the sacrifice he's making.
"I am losing my family life," he says in Spanish.
Vargas and the other men pick carrots, cabbage, and cucumbers, sometimes for 12 hours a day. They are here through the Seasonal Agricultural Workers Program, a joint agreement between Canada and Mexico that allows them to work in Canada for up to eight months. Employers must prove there is a labour shortage in their community before hiring though the program.
Aaron Herbert runs the farm with his wife Janelle Herbert and works in
the vegetable fields with the migrant farm workers. Herbert says he'd
rather hire locally, but no one in Edmonton is willing to work for $12
an hour, the wage he has advertised locally. And the local people who
do take the jobs do not last long, he says, nor are they as reliable
as Vargas and the other men.
"The work ethic these guys have blows away anything else I've seen,"
he says. "It's not like they are the fastest or the hardest workers,
but they are steady and don't complain."
But he feels badly about separating the men from their families, and would rather hire single men. Last year, one of the workers had a child die in Mexico while he was working on the farm, but didn't tell Aaron or Janelle Herbert, neither of whom speaks much Spanish and who only found out about the tragedy much later.
"He appeared to be happy, so we didn't know," Herbert says. If he'd known, he would have let the man go home to his family.
All four men at Riverbend Gardens are married with families, and all four men plan on continuing their migrant lifestyle in the near future.
Having family in Mexico is a part of what makes the migrant workers program so effective, says Alberto Lozano, spokesperson for the Mexican Embassy in Canada. Not only are people with dependents the most in need of jobs; it also ensures that the migrant workers return to Mexico. "That's why it's working here," he says. "If we had this kind of program in the U.S., we would have solved many problems for them and for us."
None of the migrant farm workers at Riverbend Gardens has plans to immigrate to Canada and obtain residency status, nor is it something Gabino Tapia has thought about.
"Right now, it's difficult to answer that question," says the 42-year-old father of four. "I would have to talk to my family about it. My children are getting older, and it's complicated.
It's one thing for him to live in a trailer on someone else's farm if he's alone and just here to work. But if he were to bring his family here, those living conditions would not be acceptable. He feels his family lives better in Mexico.
Fellow workers Lazro Hernandez and Romiro Delos Santos feel the same
way. Even if it were possible to bring his wife and three children to
Edmonton, says Hernandez, he would be leaving his parents, uncles,
aunts, and friends behind. That's not a sacrifice he's prepared to
make. Delos Santos agrees:
"We come from a small town," he says. "I miss it a lot."
The only other problem they mention has to do with their wages. The four men at Riverbend are paid $8.67 per hour, after a 20-cent raise they received this year. But they have heard that other migrant workers are paid up to $9.50 per hour. Herbert says he can't offer those wages and still provide housing and plane tickets for the men.
Workplaces are not monitored as closely as they should be. Most of the migrant farm workers who come to Canada through the seasonal program don't speak English, and basic information about their rights while they work here are not provided for them in Spanish, she says. They may
find good employers, she adds, but that has nothing to do with the overall structure of the program.
In her work as an advocate for migrant workers, she has travelled though the states of Mexico, Tlaxcala, and Morelos, speaking with families whose husbands and fathers participate in the seasonal worker program. She sees many children like Vargas' daughter who are growing
up with absentee fathers.
"The media always gets one or two voices, and the guys are so happy," she says sarcastically. "Of course he's happy.
He's making money to send home. What's he going to say?"
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