CANADA to start new Agri-Food Immigration Pilot Program in May 2020

The Canadian government has announced a new Agri-food industry migration pilot program for 3 years.

After a delay of a few weeks, the Agri-food immigration pilot program is set to start on 15 May 2020 (as per official Canadian immigration website). Low IELTS score, only secondary school certification, one year’s Canadian work experience and a job from Canada will make you through this new pilot program.

Temporary foreign workers in different eligible occupations will be able to apply for this permanent residency and will be allowed also to bring their family members. The program mainly focuses on the shortage of skilled workers, particularly in meat processing mushroom production, and other agricultural sectors. The Department of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada says that this program would help foreign workers to come to Canada through temporary work visa programs but with the ability to change this work visa to permanent residency that is a path to Canadian citizenship.

PR Quota This pilot program will be under the laws of the Immigration and Refugees Act. According to this the number of applicants for this visa category would be limited for permanent residency (so-called PR). The government is interested in having 2750 immigrants every year for the time of the first 3 years of the starting of the program. With family members, a total of 16,500 places will be available.

Agri-food pilot program is a mutual collaboration between Agriculture and Agri-food Canada and Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC).

Eligible Occupations

The occupations and industries eligible under the new Agri-Food Immigration Pilot include:

farm supervisor and specialized livestock worker for meat processing, year-round mushroom production, greenhouse crop production, or livestock raising.
meat processing (this includes retail butcher, industrial butcher, and food processing laborer)
harvesting laborer for year-round mushroom production and greenhouse crop production
general farm worker for year-round mushroom production, greenhouse crop production, or livestock raising

Agri-Food industry immigration pilot PR requirements

To be eligible for this new immigration program, the applicants must have the following:

12 months of full-time, non-seasonal Canadian work experience in the Temporary Foreign Worker Program, in an eligible occupation in processing meat products, raising livestock, or growing mushrooms or greenhouse crops
an English proficiency level of CLB 4 (General IELTS test score of 4.0)
an education at the high school level or greater (Canadian equivalency)
an indeterminate job offer for full-time, non-seasonal work in Canada, outside of Quebec, at or above the prevailing wage

Most of these sectors come from NOC category ‘C’ and ‘D’ which require workers to have a type of ‘Secondary School certificate’ with related work experience.

Agri-Food industry immigration pilot provides more security

The old seasonal program for laborers has been not that good as the owners have been exploiting the workers by underpaying them and having had them work extra hours. Facing these issues, the workers could not just leave the job, and if they do so, the result is removal from Canada. According to this new pilot program, the employees will be able to get benefits from Employment Insurance and the Canadian Pension Plan. They would be able to be a good part of social benefits through taxation.

Sample jobs