Surrey farmworker women face exploitive practices: report

South Asian immigrant farmworker women in Surrey and beyond face exploitive practices like wage theft, according to a new report.

The report by BC Policy Solutions is entitled Growing Justice: Health, safety and dignity for South Asian farmworker women in B.C.

The report details such practices as wage theft, pressure to accept unsafe transportation along with excessive and unpredictable hours.

“Agricultural workers in general are excluded from several of the basic rights granted to other workers such as overtime pay, statutory holiday pay and annual vacation pay,” said the report. “South Asian farmworker women who are new immigrants face additional vulnerabilities such as language barriers and a lack of formal job training.”

The report’s research examined what has changed in recent decades for immigrant farmworker women and what has not.

The report is based on in-depth interviews and one focus group conducted in 2023 with 20 farmworker women in the Fraser Valley. All the women researchers spoke to had immigrated to Canada from India and interviews were mainly conducted in Punjabi.

The women worked in multiple sectors including seasonal berry harvesting, mushrooms, vegetables, canneries and packing and ornamental nurseries. Most earned less than $25,000 annually.

“Our findings expose how workplace inequities are entrenched in the structural organization of agricultural labour across the province,” said the report. “Despite these women’s essential contributions to the local food economy, many continue to occupy some of the most precarious and undervalued roles in agricultural production.”

The report details extensive health and safety risks faced by farmworker women.

“Our report shows that health and safety risks are pervasive, including a lack of clean, accessible washrooms, potable water, chronic and acute physical injuries, unsafe machinery and retaliation for voicing safety concerns,” said the report. “These issues are intensified by weak enforcement and deceptive employer practices such as temporarily installing handwashing stations during WorkSafeBC inspections only to remove them once inspectors leave.

“Specifically for women, these health risks are compounded during menstruation when inadequate sanitation contributes to discomfort and potential infection risks during long shifts.”

The report highlighted the issues involving the privatized, profit-driven farm labour contracting system.

“Contractors, who act as a go-between for workers and employers, often control access to work, transportation, wages and avoid responsibility for workers’ welfare. For many women, particularly those with limited English proficiency or without independent transportation, this system creates a dependency that is frequently exploited.”

A third issue in the report was a basic lack of respect for farmworker women.

“Bullying and harsh criticism from supervisors or bosses undermined their sense of dignity,” the report said.