On Thursday, federal Agriculture Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau announced a $50-million program to get surplus perishable food products to vulnerable people during the pandemic.
According to a CBC news report, “Bibeau said 12 million kilograms of food that otherwise would have been wasted, including one million fresh eggs, would go to families.
“Surplus fruit, vegetables, meat and seafood was generated because the COVID-19 crisis shut down much of the restaurant and hospitality industry, leaving producers with unprecedented surpluses.”
Sounds good. Except that a lot of that surplus isn’t in a warehouse somewhere, easy to access. It’s still on the ground.
Another report, from Global News, says. “The Okanagan agriculture industry, especially orchards and farms, is struggling to find enough workers to harvest their crops.”
Amarjit Lalli, of B.C. Tree Fruits, estimated that 10,000 migrant workers come from Mexico or the Caribbean to pick fruit. “There are farmers out there just harvesting what they can and the rest is being left on the trees,” said Lalli.
Outside the program
Fruit left on the trees will not even enter Bibeau’s program of getting food to families and food banks.
Nor will ground crops that can’t be harvested. The Scotlynn Group in Ontario abandoned three million – three million! -- pounds of asparagus because it couldn’t find workers to harvest it.
An article in Broadview magazine quoted CEO Scott Biddle saying that his company had offered $25/hour to hire Canadians – about 40% more than the $17.69 average hourly pay of most migrant farm workers – but couldn’t find people with the skills to handle the equipment.
I wonder how Mexican workers felt, knowing that they could be paid 40% more if they were Canadian.
About how women feel about getting paid less than men for the same work, I guess. Although that gap is now down under 15%, not 40%.
As I read these figures, I wonder why farm workers aren’t classed as an essential service. Like police and paramedics. And like truckers, who can cross the border bringing vegetables from Mexico.
But not Mexican workers who could be harvesting those same vegetables here in Canada.
Pandemic regulations
Canadian pandemic regulations are part of the problem. Migrant workers must go into two weeks isolation on entry into Canada. And they must be paid while in isolation.
Mexico imposed its own restrictions on farm workers coming to Canada, after two of its citizens died from COVID-19 earlier this year at two separate Ontario farms.
Approximately 50,000 “temporary foreign workers” would come to work on Canadian farms in a normal year. But this is not a normal year.
Covid-19 regulations have forced employers to provide different housing. To set up different work arrangements, maintaining separation.
In response, said the Globe and Mail, “Agriculture employers in several provinces are restricting the movement of migrant farm workers during the pandemic… who in some cases aren’t allowed to leave the premises, even to get groceries.
“Workers told The Globe that they feel pressure to abide by the employer-imposed restrictions because their status in the country is tied to their status on the farm.”
Seasonal workers come to Canada under two programs that have been in effect for 50 years: The Seasonal Agricultural Workers Program, and the Temporary Foreign Worker Program. Both allow temporary residence in Canada to fill jobs in industries with specific labour shortages.
Both programs, by my reading, treat these foreign workers as of lesser value than Canadian workers: lower pay, longer hours, fewer rights.
If they’re essential workers, that’s not right.
Turning the viewpoint
All religions profess some kind of “Golden Rule,” -- basically, to treat others as you would like to be treated, if you were in their situation.
The key phrase is “in their situation.” Sometimes that requires re-thinking our assumptions.
When he was the United Church’s out-front voice on social justice issues, the late Clarke MacDonald frequently got accosted by people who saw the church as soft on criminals. They wanted the maximum possible punishment for rapists and murderers.
How would you feel,” they demanded, “if it was your daughter who got raped?”
MacDonald replied, “And you would you feel if your son was accused of doing it?”
I suspect that most of us would consider it unfair to be invited to perform an essential service in some other country that penalized us financially and socially compared to its own citizens.
It happens, of course. But it wouldn’t feel fair.
It’s probably not fair when we do it, either.
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Copyright © 2020 by Jim Taylor. Non-profit use in congregations and study groups encouraged; links from other blogs welcomed; all other rights reserved.
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YOUR TURN
I honestly didn’t expect the volume of correspondence that came in response to last week’s column on atrocities that we can, or cannot, speak about.
Isabel Gibson put it into perspective: “What's the old joke? ‘Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not after you.’
“Well, yes, it does mean that. Paranoia is (among other things) delusions of persecution, not the well-founded fear (or, even, the knowledge) of being persecuted.
I guess our awareness of the various atrocities depends on a few factors:
· How articulate the survivors and their descendants are (if survivors there be -- not many are speaking for the Beothuk of Newfoundland)
· What sort of stage they have for telling their story
· How close it is to us (personally, geographically, historically)
Maybe the Holocaust gets more attention than the Armenian genocide, because British, American, and Canadian Jews are more active in the entertainment business than are Armenian immigrants. And the Holomodor gets more attention on the Prairies, maybe, where Ukrainians settled, than in Central Canada or the Maritimes. And we have to go out of our way to hear about Christians being attacked in India.
“Hiroshima. Nagasaki. Bergen-Belsen. Auschwitz. Dachau. Dresden. Tokyo. The Polish Ghetto. We have more horrors to go around than we can reasonably get our heads around.
“As for laws against denials, I've heard people arguing about the necessity of, or rationale for, dropping the atomic bomb, but I've never heard anyone denying it happened. Twice. I guess that's a start on the path to coming to terms with the history.”
To the list of atrocities, Brian Ames added, “Over 100,000 allied prisoners of war died during the building of the Burma railway due to malicious cruelties and starvation by the Japanese. Many of those survivors had life-long effects.”
David Edwards noted, “We could also include our own determination, through residential schools and forced adoptions, to ‘eliminate the Indian problem by eliminating the Indian’.”
Doug Martindale “introduced a motion in the Manitoba Legislature (which passed) declaring the last Saturday in November each year as the Day of Ukrainian Famine/Genocide, commemorating the victims of the Holodomor 1932-1933. This tragedy is burned into the memory of Ukrainians in Ukraine and their diaspora around the world [JT, especially in Canada on the prairies].
“I'm wondering if there is a reason why the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki are not remembered in the same way as other tragic losses of life? Is it because they can't be classified as a genocide because it wasn't an attempt to erase a whole nation or ethnic group? I think the use of the atomic bomb is more easily forgotten, or even deliberately forgotten. because of who the perpetrators were. The Ukrainian famine/genocide was undertaken by the Russians who were Communists and therefor easy to vilify. The Holocaust was executed by Germans who were our enemies in WW11.
“The big difference with Hiroshima and Nagasaki was that the perpetrator was a predominantly white Christian nation, the USA, who were very much like us and were our
ally in WW11. This makes it much harder for us to accept responsibility. And we Canadians supplied the uranium for the Manhattan Project from the Eldorado Mine on Great Bear Lake, North West Territories. Canada.”
Laurna Tallman further explored the Canadian connection: “Indeed, Hiroshima deserves to be on that list.
My father worked for the National Research Council during WW II. He advised the Canadian government on atomic energy. He was on the design team for the first nuclear power plant in Canada. I vividly recall his precise sketches of how a nuclear reactor works, when I was studying high school chemistry and physics. In other ways, he strictly observed the rules of secrecy to which he was sworn when he entered that work. The development of the atomic bomb was to provide a deterrent.
“When Harry Truman unilaterally reversed that policy to unleash horror on the ordinary citizens of Japan, my father became deeply disillusioned. He left the NRC, which the encyclopedia describes as having become ‘a war machine’ during WW II, to enter private industry.”
John Shaffer: “I have a friend who believes that dropping the bomb saved his life. He was scheduled for a land invasion of Japan, which he believes would have killed thousands of Japanese by conventional means, as well as thousands of those who would have launched the attack, including him. In other words, he believes that Truman saved his life by dropping the bomb. The discussion gets a bit personal.
“One bomb made the point; where was the morality in a 2nd bomb? I still regret that it was my nation and my leaders who made the decision to use the bomb. Where is our moral standing in telling others they cannot use the bomb to achieve their goals?”
Tom Watson wondered, “Is it the case that who commits a horrible act determines whether it's considered an atrocity? The victorious side rarely gets called too account.
One of Steve Roney’s friends once did some editing work for Ernst Zundel, and “concluded that he was a man of principle” even if those principles were wrong, and who assumed Hitler must also..
Steve mused, “I think there is a vast difference between a Hitler and a Zundel. Hitler and the Nazis were all and only about the urge for power. There was no principle involved—it was whatever got power.
“Zundel was the opposite. And the same has to be true of anyone claiming to be a neo-Nazi or to like Hitler today. They have to be doing it on principle, if mistaken principle, because it only does them personal harm and ensures they will never be given a position of power.”
“History is complicated,” Bob Rollwagen reminded me. “As we remember Hiroshima and Nagasaki, a war ended in seconds and the two nations now work together in peace.”
Jeff Rucker introduced me to Holocaust “revisionism,” which applies empirical skepticism to the evidence for the Holocaust -- not the same thing as denial.
And Robert Caughell caught a clear error in my column: “I think that you meant to say that Carlton Street runs EAST of Yonge Street,” not west.
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TECHNICAL STUFF
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PROMOTION STUFF…
To use the links in this section, you’ll have to insert the necessary symbols. (This is to circumvent filters that think some of these links are spam.)
Wayne Irwin's “Churchweb Canada,” is an inexpensive service for any congregation wanting to develop a web presence, with free consultation. http://wwwDOTchurchwebcanadaDOTca. He set up my webpage, and he doesn’t charge enough.
I recommend Isabel Gibson’s thoughtful and well-written blog, wwwDOTtraditionaliconoclastDOTcom. She also runs beautiful pictures. Her Thanksgiving presentation on the old hymn, For the Beauty of the Earth, Is, well, beautiful -- https://www.traditionaliconoclast.com/2019/10/13/for/
Tom Watson writes a weekly blog called “The View from Grandpa Tom’s Balcony” -- ruminations on various subjects, and feedback from Tom’s readers. Write him at tomwatsoATgmailDOTcom (NB that’s “watso” not “watson”)
ALVA WOOD ARCHIVE
The late Alva Wood’s collection of satiric and sometimes wildly funny columns about a mythical village’s misadventures now have an archive (don’t ask how this happened) on my website: http://quixotic.ca/Alva-Wood-Archive. Feel free to browse all 550 columns.