Food workers don’t have enough to eat

By Catherine Couturier Oct 23rd, 2026

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In 5 seconds A survey of 283 migrant workers in Quebec’s farming and food-processing industries reveals many suffer from food insecurity: they're going hungry.

Temporary migrant workers help feed Quebec, yet they struggle to feed themselves properly.
Photo : Getty

Quebec has more temporary migrant workers than any other province except Ontario, but they are barely able to feed themselves, a new study reveals.

“It’s largely thanks to them that we have fresh local fruits and vegetables,” noted Rosanne Blanchet, a professor in the Department of Social and Preventive Medicine at Université de Montréal.

“These are workers who are essential for Quebec’s food security.”

Yet the very people who harvest and process fresh food for Quebecers to consume often struggle to feed themselves. The reasons are many, and it's not simply a question of them lacking food.

“Food insecurity means you’re worried about running out of food – and so it can lead people to choose cheaper foods, skip meals or even go without food for an entire day," said Blanchet.

That said, "there’s little data on food insecurity, particularly among temporary migrant workers, but we suspected they were highly vulnerable to it," she added.

To find out, in 2024 and 2025 Blanchet and Lara Gautier, a professor in the Department of Health Management, Evaluation and Policy, interviewed 283 temporary foreign workers in the Quebec's food industry.

The professors were helped by a 25-person research team—including Théa Demmers, a doctoral student in public health—and numerous partners. The project was funded by the Centre for Public Health Research and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.

Initial findings were recently published in the Canadian Journal of Public Health.

Rosanne Blanchet, professor in the Department of Social and Preventive Medicine at Université de Montréal’s School of Public Health
Photo : Rosanne Blanchet

A province-wide snapshot

The study focused on two groups of temporary migrants: farm workers and workers in the food-processing industry.

“We compared the living and working conditions of these two groups with precarious status and explored the reasons why some are in a more vulnerable situation,” Blanchet said.

Between June 2024 and July 2025, the team conducted video interviews—in Spanish, French or English—with migrant workers in 14 of Quebec’s 17 administrative regions. Participants came from a dozen countries, mostly in Latin America, and spoke more than 40 mother tongues.

Théa Demmers, doctoral student at Université de Montréal's School of Public Health
Photo : Théa Demmers

Farm workers face the steepest barriers

While both groups of workers are in precarious situations, the initial quantitative results reveal a particularly formidable set of barriers for farm workers. They were almost all men from Latin America and the Caribbean, while the food-processing workers included about 10 per cent women and had a better command of French and English.

Lower language proficiency among farm workers—61 per cent had a limited knowledge of French or English versus 14 per cent of food-processing workers—combined with lower education levels and longer working hours, especially during harvest season, contributed to their greater vulnerability.

“These workers are not in a position to say no to their employer,” Demmers said, noting that for 31 per cent of the farm workers it's the employer who decides when and how they can get food, compared with six per cent of the food-processing workers.

The difference is partly due to housing conditions. The employers are required by law to provide housing, which in the case of farm workers is most often located in rural areas, far from towns and stores.

This often means overcrowded living quarters and difficulty getting to the grocery store.

“During harvest season, it can be two weeks before you can go grocery shopping,” Blanchet said. “And when you have five men who eat a lot because they are doing physical labour and they have to share a fridge, that's a problem.”

Two to three times the provincial average

All these obstacles have consequences for the workers’ food security: 66 per cent of the farm workers interviewed and 42 per cent of the food-processing workers reported experiencing food insecurity.

They weren't eating enough food, or eating food of poor quality, or skipping meals.

“That’s roughly two to three times the provincial average,” Demmers estimated, citing Statistics Canada data that put the figure at nearly 20 per cent for Quebec overall.

Food insecurity can affect mental health and increase the risk of chronic diseases. “This isn’t just a nutrition issue; it’s a public-health issue and a matter of fairness,” Demmers said.

The research team is taking a deeper look now to understand the factors that influence food insecurity. The interviews will be complemented by "photo-voices": workers are being asked to take pictures to document their working conditions and points of view.

“We still have a lot of data to analyze so that we'll be able to shed more light on this critical and invisible situation,” Blanchet said.

“Community organizations and advocates have long been calling for structural reforms, such as open work permits and housing standards,” Demmers concluded. “Our findings support these demands.”

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