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Caxaj CS, Weiler AM, Martyniuk J. Housing Conditions and Health Implications for Migrant Agricultural Workers in Canada: A Scoping Review. Can J Nurs Res 2024; 56:16-28. [PMID: 37844611 PMCID: PMC10804689 DOI: 10.1177/08445621231203086] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/18/2023] Open
Abstract
Migrant agricultural workers face various health inequities that have led to preventable illness and death. This paper investigates how material housing conditions have shaped physical and mental health outcomes for temporary foreign workers in Canadian agriculture. We conducted a scoping review of literature on migrant agricultural worker housing in Canada published between 2000-2022, analysing insights on the physical quality of workers' housing in relation to international frameworks on housing quality. Our review revealed a range of housing-related health risks, including: (1) Sanitation, food security, and water; (2) Thermal safety, electricity, and utilities; (3) Habitability of structure, air quality, and exposure to hazards; (4) Spacing, privacy, and co-worker relations and; (5) Geographic proximity to necessary services and social opportunities. Although housing has been increasingly recognized as a social determinant of health, little research examines how migrant farmworkers' accommodations shape their health outcomes, particularly in Canada. This scoping review provides timely insights and recommendations to inform research, policy, and public health interventions.
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Affiliation(s)
- C. Susana Caxaj
- Arthur Labatt Family School of Nursing, Health Sciences, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada
| | - Anelyse M. Weiler
- Department of Sociology, University of Victoria, Victoria, B.C., Canada
| | - Julia Martyniuk
- University of Toronto Libraries, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
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Basok T, Tucker EM, Vosko LF, Caxaj CS, Hennebry JL, Mayell S, McLaughlin J, Weiler AM. The ‘contract’ and its discontents: Can it address protection gaps for migrant agricultural workers in Canada? International Migration 2023. [DOI: 10.1111/imig.13121] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/16/2023]
Affiliation(s)
- Tanya Basok
- Department of Sociology, Anthropology and Criminology University of Windsor Windsor Canada
| | | | - Leah F. Vosko
- Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies York University Toronto Canada
| | - C. Susana Caxaj
- Arthur Labatt Family School of Nursing Western University London Canada
| | - Jenna L. Hennebry
- Balsillie School of International Affairs Wilfrid Laurier University Canada
| | | | - Janet McLaughlin
- Faculty of Human and Social Sciences Wilfrid Laurier University Canada
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Weiler AM. Seeing the workers for the trees: exalted and devalued manual labour in the Pacific Northwest craft cider industry. Agric Human Values 2021; 39:65-78. [PMID: 34092914 PMCID: PMC8164685 DOI: 10.1007/s10460-021-10226-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 05/22/2021] [Indexed: 06/12/2023]
Abstract
Craft food and beverage makers regularly emphasize transparency about the ethical, sustainable sourcing of their ingredients and the human labour underpinning their production, all of which helps elevate the status of their products and occupational communities. Yet, as with other niche ethical consumption markets, craft industries continue to rely on employment conditions for agricultural workers that reproduce inequalities of race, class, and citizenship in the dominant food system. This paper interrogates the contradiction between the exaltation of craft cidermakers' labour and the devaluation of farmworker labour by assessing how craft beverage actors make sense of inequalities facing manually skilled agricultural workers. Through a focus on the emerging craft cider industry, this paper draws on in-depth interviews and ethnographic data with a range of urban and rural cider actors in the Pacific Northwest (British Columbia, Oregon, and Washington State). I find that actors in the craft cider industry engage with inequalities affecting farmworkers through three main patterns: (1) Justifications of the status quo; (2) Supply chain fog; and (3) Misgiving/critique. By using an analytical framework that integrates critical agrarianism and the politics of sight, this study provides insights into both barriers and opportunities to redistribute social recognition and material rewards across food supply chains.
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Affiliation(s)
- Anelyse M. Weiler
- Department of Sociology, STN CSC, University of Victoria, PO Box 3050, Victoria, BC V8W 3P5 Canada
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Weiler AM, Hergesheimer C, Brisbois B, Wittman H, Yassi A, Spiegel JM. Food sovereignty, food security and health equity: a meta-narrative mapping exercise. Health Policy Plan 2015; 30:1078-92. [PMID: 25288515 PMCID: PMC4559116 DOI: 10.1093/heapol/czu109] [Citation(s) in RCA: 56] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 08/29/2014] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
There has been growing policy interest in social justice issues related to both health and food. We sought to understand the state of knowledge on relationships between health equity--i.e. health inequalities that are socially produced--and food systems, where the concepts of 'food security' and 'food sovereignty' are prominent. We undertook exploratory scoping and mapping stages of a 'meta-narrative synthesis' on pathways from global food systems to health equity outcomes. The review was oriented by a conceptual framework delineating eight pathways to health (in)equity through the food system: 1--Multi-Scalar Environmental, Social Context; 2--Occupational Exposures; 3--Environmental Change; 4--Traditional Livelihoods, Cultural Continuity; 5--Intake of Contaminants; 6--Nutrition; 7--Social Determinants of Health and 8--Political, Economic and Regulatory context. The terms 'food security' and 'food sovereignty' were, respectively, paired with a series of health equity-related terms. Combinations of health equity and food security (1414 citations) greatly outnumbered pairings with food sovereignty (18 citations). Prominent crosscutting themes that were observed included climate change, biotechnology, gender, racialization, indigeneity, poverty, citizenship and HIV as well as institutional barriers to reducing health inequities in the food system. The literature indicates that food sovereignty-based approaches to health in specific contexts, such as advancing healthy school food systems, promoting soil fertility, gender equity and nutrition, and addressing structural racism, can complement the longer-term socio-political restructuring processes that health equity requires. Our conceptual model offers a useful starting point for identifying interventions with strong potential to promote health equity. A research agenda to explore project-based interventions in the food system along these pathways can support the identification of ways to strengthen both food sovereignty and health equity.
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Affiliation(s)
- Anelyse M Weiler
- Sociology, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada, Faculty of Land and Food Systems, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada, Global Health Research Program, School of Population and Public Health, University of British Columbia Sociology, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada, Faculty of Land and Food Systems, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada, Global Health Research Program, School of Population and Public Health, University of British Columbia
| | - Chris Hergesheimer
- Sociology, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada, Faculty of Land and Food Systems, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada, Global Health Research Program, School of Population and Public Health, University of British Columbia
| | - Ben Brisbois
- Sociology, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada, Faculty of Land and Food Systems, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada, Global Health Research Program, School of Population and Public Health, University of British Columbia
| | - Hannah Wittman
- Sociology, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada, Faculty of Land and Food Systems, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada, Global Health Research Program, School of Population and Public Health, University of British Columbia
| | - Annalee Yassi
- Sociology, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada, Faculty of Land and Food Systems, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada, Global Health Research Program, School of Population and Public Health, University of British Columbia
| | - Jerry M Spiegel
- Sociology, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada, Faculty of Land and Food Systems, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada, Global Health Research Program, School of Population and Public Health, University of British Columbia
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