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horticulture sector labour market partnership on December 6.


“It’s looking at the semi- skilled and skilled level – the manager and above,” BC Agriculture Council executive director Reg Ens explains. “We’ve had a problem with low-skilled for a long time, and there’s some things that we’ve been doing to meet that need, but now we’ve identified this semi-skilled/skilled [shortfall].” BCAC and the BC Landscape and Nursery Association will administer the funds, which will assist in bringing together industry associations and employers to determine the horticulture sector’s key labour force challenges.


“It’s cultivating connections and looking for opportunities. Are there pools of under- employed people that we’re not attracting?” Ens says. “Do these under-employed people that are interested know


where the opportunities are?” The project is set to complete by March 15. It complements similar initiatives for the landscape and abattoir sectors.


No small task


But resolving the labour issue isn’t easy. The lack of workers who are both reliable and equipped with the skills to handle the unique challenges of farm work has been a perennial problem in BC.


While proximity to urban areas should ensure ready access to a large pool of labour, there’s also greater competition from other sectors for workers. Often, the alternatives also pay better and have more attractive working conditions than field work.


“There is not a simple way forward,” says Debra Hauer, project manager with CAHRC. She notes that BC is already doing plenty of things right: many employers in the province have low turnover and there are more than the usual amount of training programs, both formal and informal, highlighting opportunities in the sector. These include everything from Agriculture in the Classroom programs to sector-specific initiatives such as the organic sector provides.


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“There’s lots of groups doing interesting things in British Columbia,” she says. While some sectors, such as dairy and poultry, have embraced automation and face a shortage of workers with appropriate skills, the backbone of the BC farm


nfrom page 1


labour force is horticultural workers. Approximately 48% of farm workers are engaged in producing and harvesting fruits, vegetables, flowers and other products.


CAHRC says the fact that many of these jobs are seasonal in nature works against employers.


Since few of the positions are year-round, many operations find themselves forced to let workers go, and then scramble to rehire staff in subsequent seasons. The temporary nature of the work also creates a highly mobile workforce. This has led to many hort operations turning to foreign workers. CAHRC said the shortfall in 2014 was made up through 6,800 temporary foreign workers (TFWs) – and even then, there was still a need for approximately 3,000 more domestic workers. The labour shortfall costs the sector approximately $70 million annually, CAHRC says. With the shortfall in


domestic workers increasing over the next decade, there are growing efforts to make it easier for farmers to hire foreign help.


“This may include re-evaluating the


effectiveness of Canada’s immigration programs in terms of meeting the needs of the agriculture sector,” writes the Conference Board of Canada in a recent briefing paper, produced with CAHRC’s support. “Without TFWs, we may face the prospect of a significant portion of Canada’s arable land lying fallow. That would be a tragedy.”


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COUNTRY LIFE IN BC • JANUARY 2017


FREIGHT FARMS nfrom page 1


seemed like a great fit with my administrative, technical and foodie interests.”


What’s inside the box is an intensive, high-tech hydroponic vertical growing system that maximizes productivity on a tiny footprint. High efficiency LED light strips provide crops with the red and blue light spectrum required for photosynthesis. A closed-loop hydroponic system delivers a nutrient-rich water solution directly to the roots of the plants, using only 10 gallons of water a day. A multi-planed airflow and intercrop aeration system automatically regulates temperature and humidity through a series of sensors and controls. Everything can be monitored remotely using a cell phone app or laptop. “At any given time, there’s a little over 7,000 plants from seedlings to mature plants growing in here. The automation helps a great deal in that our water quality is continually being assessed by various sensors and nutrients are being added (and) pH adjustments are being made as needed without me having to test them daily, so it saves a lot of time,” Knott explains. The unit is currently producing 80 pounds of fresh greens each week and Knott hopes to increase that by another 10% to 20% as she finds higher producing varieties and fine-tunes her system. According to Freight Farms, each 40-foot shipping container can grow the equivalent of two acres of field production. It hasn’t taken long to find a niche in the local market. Less than six months into production, she has been selling out each week. Knott sells to several local restaurants and caterers, as well as local food grocers and a weekly share program. Whatever is left is sold to retail customers that can pop in on Saturday morning. “One of the things the chefs like is that we have the types of greens they want, they are perfectly clean, and there is no waste,” says Knott, adding the price premium has not proven to be a barrier because of the consistent quality. “Our retail customers love it because they know when they buy it, they will be able to use the whole package.”


Knott’s unit sits on a friend’s acreage in West Saanich but unlike soil-based farms, moving this operation only requires a crane and a flatbed truck.


“All I need is a hose and a plug in and I’m good to go,” she says with a laugh.


The original inspiration behind the design was to bring food production into urban environments to ensure greater access to fresh food. In fact, shipping containers for food production are popping up in old parkades, university campuses and inner-city lots. It’s something that Knott would like to see municipalities in BC consider. “You can put a Freight Farm on what I call the odd bits, the slivers of land in dense urban settings that nobody is going to develop,” says Knox. “Often, remediation means digging up contaminated soils and moving them somewhere else, contaminating another place. That doesn’t make sense. Pave it, seal it, put these units on top of it and turn it into a farm.”


“I think there’s a lot from a municipal perspective that could be done with zoning to turn those odd bits into something very productive for the community and more attractive as well,” she adds.


Northern opportunity


While there are hundreds of Freight Farms operating in the United States, Bright Greens Canada is the only one in BC, and one of a very small number across Canada. Knott sees a lot of potential for shipping container-based for the Prairie winters and more remote and northern communities where fresh produce is expensive when it’s available at all.


“It makes a lot of sense to grow these types of very perishable greens in this setting instead of trying to grow them in Mexico and put them on a truck and have them sit on the truck for three weeks until they get here,” she says. “I think as we build the business and expand what we’re doing, it’s going to offer something worthwhile to our community and help make us more self-sufficient in producing better quality food.”


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