Is health a labour, citizenship or human right? Mexican seasonal agricultural workers in Leamington, Canada

Abstract

Post-North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) trade liberalisation combined with post-9/11 border securitisation means North America increasingly relies on pools of temporary foreign labour, particularly in the agricultural and service sectors. Despite being temporary, these workers often spend most of their years on foreign soil, living and working in isolated rural communities, far from their own families and communities. Migrants' mental and physical health suffers due to hazardous and stressful working conditions, sub-standard housing, lack of social support and limited access to health and social welfare services. Assuming access to health is a basic human right, who is responsible for the health of temporary foreign migrant workers? Is it the nation-state? or the Employers and/or unions? or Civil society? Research and practice show that a combined multisector approach is best; however, such initiatives are often uneven due to questions of sovereignty and citizenship rights. Community-based organisations (CBOs) have emerged to advocate for and serve migrants' social and welfare needs; analysis of CBO projects reveals an uneven application of rights to migrants. Using a comparative case study from Canada, this project contributes to understanding how civil-society helps to activate different types of health care rights for migrants, and to create an informed policy that provides migrant workers with access to a wider range of human and health rights.

Keywords:

• minority health
• migrant
• Latino health
• farmworker
• Canada
• civil society

Acknowledgements

I would like to acknowledge the Canadian Embassy in Washington, DC, for their generous support of this research project.

Notes

1. The SAWP has been extensively described by the following researchers: Gabriel and Macdonald, ‘Citizenship at the Margins: The Canadian Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program and Civil Society Advocacy’ (2011); Basok, ‘Human Rights and Citizenship: The Case of Mexican Migrants in Canada’ (2003); Basok, ‘Post-national Citizenship, Social Exclusion and Migrant Rights: Mexican Seasonal Workers in Canada’ (2004).

2. The minimum wage for agricultural labour in 2009 was $9.50 an hour and many work 8–10 hours a day (50–70 hours a week), earning approximately $500 a week, after taxes. There are approximately 15,000 migrants (the majority of the SAWP workers that come from Mexico) living and working in the Leamington area.