Ontario Supporting Agri-Food Sector with New Labour Strategy

The Ontario government is launching an agri-food labour strategy that will address sector labour challenges and ensure a stronger, more sustainable and innovative agri-food industry.

Ernie Hardeman, Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs and Monte McNaughton, Minister of Labour, Training and Skills Development announced the strategy and two initial projects during a virtual roundtable with leaders from Ontario’s agri-food supply chain.

Minister Hardeman expanded on the government’s investment of $812,000 to two projects aimed at labour shortages. The program includes:

• $617,400 for the Ontario Federation of Agriculture for Feeding Your Future: Connecting Ontario’s Agri-Food Workforce, a platform that helps fill the labour shortage through a job matching concierge service, and provides free virtual career fairs, webinar series and specialized training opportunities.
• $195,000 for Food and Beverage Ontario to implement a strategy that will address critical challenges facing the sector such as talent attraction and retention, skills development, and innovation.

Working together with industry partners, the strategy will promote career opportunities and support training in the agri-food sector while identifying concrete actions to make the agri-food value chain more resilient.

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