Weathering the Harvest: Voices from the Frontlines of Canada’s Climate Crisis

From life-threatening heatwaves and unpredictable storms, to prolonged periods of drought and wildfire smoke, the challenges posed by extreme weather are escalating. The NFU is calling for expanded workplace safety regulations, strengthened labour and migration rights, and comprehensive climate action to address the escalating impacts of the climate crisis on agriculture and reduce fatality and injury rates in the sector. 

Weathering the Harvest: Voices from the Frontlines of Canada’s Climate Crisis, is a storytelling and advocacy campaign painting an intimate and confronting portrait of the daily realities of farming in an increasingly hostile climate. Farmers and farm workers are sharing their stories capturing the impacts of the climate crisis on health and safety.  

 Take Action!

1. Sign the open letter

2. Share Your Story

The National Farmers Union wants Canadians to understand the impact climate change is having on farmers and farm workers, and we think there is nothing more powerful than messages directly from the field.  

This season, share YOUR stories through photos and videos of the impact that extreme weather is having on you, livestock, or the farm. NFU staff will share them with news outlets, social media and allied organisations.

Picked cucumbers in over 30 °C degrees? Can’t see the sun through the smoke? Unprecedented rains flooding your fields? Livestock health threatened by extreme weather? Snap a pic or take a video of your work and send it to kaya@nfu.ca with the following information:

• Your name
• Your location (region mandatory, farm name optional)
• A description of what is in the image or video
• How the heat is affecting you, the farm, or your livestock (what you’re doing to keep safe, what it’s like working in the heat, whatever impacts matter most to you!)
• Why climate action and/or workplace safety matters to you, in light of these impacts
• Whether you are open to being mentioned by name on social media or in a press release and interviewed by media
• If interested in being mentioned on social media, your social media @account 
• You can also share to your social media and tag @nfucanada for a repost

Policy Context

Across the provinces, existing Occupational Health and Safety legislation is inadequate to properly protect outdoor workers from the health impacts of climate change. 

While the provinces are aware of the challenges facing workers, only British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Quebec and Newfoundland and Labrador have Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) regulations specifically targeting the hazards of heat stress. While all provincial OHS legislation includes a “general duty clause” which establishes a fundamental duty of employers to ensure workplace safety, relying only on the “general duty clause” means that employers and workers lack the detailed – and enforceable – guidelines necessary to effectively manage specific hazards. This can lead to inconsistent safety practices and increased risk for workers. Specific OHS regulations are essential for ensuring comprehensive and effective protection in the workplace.

None of the provinces have OHS regulations addressing wildfire smoke. 2023 was Canada’s worst recorded year for wildfires, with a documented 18.5 million hectares of land burnt (144% more than the 1989 record of 7.6 million hectares). Canada had 870 poor air quality days collectively between April 1 and September 30 last year. Wildfire smoke exacerbates risk of heat stress and dehydration. Symptoms of smoke exposure can include: cough, sore throat, burning eyes, running nose, wheezing and difficulty breathing. Workers with respiratory conditions, heart conditions, other health conditions, or who are elderly or pregnant are more vulnerable to serious harm from wildfire smoke. Wildfires are a growing concern across the country, yet employers are currently left without clear protocols to follow. 

In addition to inconsistent health and safety regulations, many of the provinces exclude farm workers from basic protections laid out in Employment Standards legislation, such as minimum wage, mandatory rest periods, or the right to unionise. Migrant farm workers are especially vulnerable to extreme heat events—due to both the nature of their work and, for many, their precarious employment status. Without the security of permanent resident status, many fear deportation and retaliation if they speak out against unsafe conditions. 

With increased investments in infrastructure and personal protective equipment (PPE) to protect staff from heat and wildfire smoke, farm employers are footing the bill for Canada’s climate neglect. Floods and fires damage crops and infrastructure, and worker safety regulations, while welcome and necessary, place additional financial burdens on producers.

The NFU is calling for the federal government to support farmers while expediting the phase-out of oil and gas tax breaks and subsidies and increasing financial support for farmers and farm workers to address the escalating impacts of the climate crisis on the agricultural sector and reduce fatality and injury rates in the sector. 

In 2022, the federal government spent over $6 billion CAD in subsidies for the oil & gas industry. Instead of subsidising industries that are contributing to extreme weather events, the federal government must release funds immediately to (a) help agricultural employers meet the labour and infrastructure challenges of the climate crisis and (b) support producers to adapt to climate change.

Policies for Safer Workplaces

Occupational Health and Safety

• Alberta, Ontario, Nova Scotia and PEI must adopt Occupational Health and Safety regulations specifically addressing the hazards of heat stress
• Proactive inspections & enforcement
• Anti-reprisal mechanisms & whistleblower protections
• Access to shade structures, shaded work & rest areas, and indoor cooling stations
• Heat stress related breaks & appropriate work/rest cycling
• Access to cold, potable drinking water at no cost to workers 
• Paid heat stress training
• Buddy system
• Accessible bathrooms in the field
• Sufficient wash stations to rinse sweat-prohibiting pesticides
• Employer-provided farmworker housing included under the OHS Act, including provisions for mandatory active cooling in on-farm housing and a maximum temperature requirement of 26 °C. 
• Language justice – that resources be made available in farm workers native languages 

Labour and Immigration Rights

• Farmworker inclusion under key employment standards (see chart on page 8)
• 10 employer-paid sick days 
• The right to form and be represented by a union 
• Permanent status for all so that migrants can access & enforce all their rights
• Anti-reprisal mechanisms & whistleblower protections
• Hazard pay (subsidised wage top-ups when performing work that exposes workers to severe and unavoidable climate hazards such as extreme heat, wildfire smoke, or dangerous evacuations)
• Disaster relief (wages paid out to workers when the farm is rendered inoperational due to natural disaster in the short or longer term). 

Limiting the Effects of Climate Change

• Institute a Canadian Farm Resiliency Agency (CFRA) to support the adoption of on-farm climate solutions
• See our climate change page for more of the NFU’s climate work
• We know that there are many specific climate solutions that have been circulating for decades and are being advanced by the NFU and beyond. Some of the basic calls for climate action fall within the categories of decarbonization, a just transition, dramatically cutting emissions, and expedite the phase out of subsidies to oil and gas and other extractive industries