Moving Images Distribution (MID) had a conversation with the team behind "Lost Years: How Canada Extracts the Lives of Migrant Farm Workers."
Directed by Jesse Parker Hart & Gabriel Olivella (Gabe)
Produced by Fuerza Migrante (Alejandro & Alexandra)
Fuerza Migrante is a community organization that seeks to transform a world stained by exploitation and injustice. Fuerza Migrante works to build an autonomous movement of migrants, based on mutual aid and community defense.
MID:
How did this film and the relationship with Fuerza Migrante begin?
Jesse:
Fuerza Migrante came to one of my classes I was taking in university. Alejandro spoke about the situation and their organization. As I learned about the situation, I thought this would be a great documentary subject, and that’s how it started.
MID:
What was the process of making the film?
Jesse:
There were a lot of steps in filming. We were volunteering and doing it on the side and when we could and slowly building the story. Working around, how can we go to these farms? How can we film? We tried to have a plan of what we could film, but also things happened spontaneously. Some of the workers would send us their own interviews. We started gathering, organizing and editing with our resources in 2017 and with the final touches in 2020. I didn’t speak Spanish very well when we first started the project, that's when I asked Gabe if he wanted to help with it. Now, I do speak Spanish enough to understand the interviews. That’s how long it took to make this film.
MID:
Has anything changed since the film was shot or are situations similar?
Alexandra:
It's very similar. I've been supporting migrant workers for the last 8-10 years and it’s the same. I'm sure the workers that came during the first season in the 1970s are going to see their own experience reflected on this video too. I don't think anything has changed.
MID:
Did you anticipate your career as a filmmaker leading here? Do you think you'll carry on a similar path with films in the future?
Jesse:
I wanted to study Film at university, and I ended up doing Latin American Studies. I wanted to combine the two into something meaningful and to recognize my privilege. I migrated from the U.S. (my mom is Canadian), it was easy for me to come to Canada and have all the advantages. As someone from the U.S., immigration is a huge topic. I definitely want to do more work in this area, bringing issues to light. I'm happy Gabe and I have been able to stay involved with the organization all this time.
MID:
How about you, Gabe? You were brought on after Jesse had started the project. Did you expect to be making films?
Gabe:
It was definitely a surprise, one of those nice presents life brings along the way and it opened up a world of possibilities for me in terms of how film gets to be powerful. After this project took shape and had legs and we started working on it more seriously. You can do much with filmmaking. Definitely, I look forward to working on more projects in the future.
MID:
Was there anything you learned? What shocked you, stuck with you?
Jesse:
How much these employers could get away with. Giving the workers terrible living conditions. Seeing the bunk beds, they were all crammed into such a small space. The workers weren’t here enjoying nice scenery or getting to travel, they were at the farm and without time off. Being isolated, not having contact with other people seems like a small detail, but it’s pretty powerful to their experience. It feeds into how many Canadians or residents don't know about this, or don’t feel a personal connection.
Gabe:
I would emphasize the isolation component. For me something that would always leave me thinking, how far away they are from my reality. How different my reality is as a migrant, how differently we get to experience this country. They’re isolation also allows for all of these issues of access to different services, and even to basic information on their rights.
Jesse:
A couple of times when I went to Walmart with Alejandro while some of the workers were getting their groceries. We were there to see if they wanted to talk or learn about the options the organization provides. A lot of people didn't want to engage, there was fear to even learn more about their rights. They didn’t want their employers to think they were “organizing” as it could disrupt their chances of coming back.
Alejandro:
Sometimes we can't go to the farms. They live by their employer. The workers fear the cameras will tip them off. The workers at a farm, they're all not all on the same page. One of them sees us, understands telling the employer that a political visitor came might make them look good with the employer, therefore they tell them. Sometimes we do have to meet workers at a large grocery store or when they're out away from their farm. We try to always be careful. I'm not a migrant farm worker, I never was. The worker is the one putting themselves at risk when they come talk to us, not us, putting ourselves at risk. We always try to be very mindful of that.
Alexandra:
We've seen with workers that decide to go home in states of emergency, the employers get upset, workers abandon their work, the job, they don't call them the next season. The problem with this work permit tied to one employer is the employer needs to include them in a list of workers for the next season or they will be out.
Alejandro:
If a worker gets injured at work, there is pressure not to communicate that. To work through that injury, to find their own medicine in order to continue coming to work.
MID:
How do you think the government can better support their working families overall?
Alejandro:
They spend 8-10 months, up to two years away from their families, and away from their communities, despite them articulating they want to come here for their families. Often migrant workers ask themselves where am I temporary? Am I temporary here in Canada, or am I temporary in my own home country? Many of them have come forward with ideas of letting family come. Whether it's for the entirety of their program or simply to have a vacation. We have an off balance relationship, the workers are feeling they need to to appease the desires of the employers, of the government officials. It would require workers to be immediately involved in the development of their contract and of the program. Both at the provincial level to work their contract out, but also at the federal level, which oversees the program.
Alexandra:
Another way to solve this or to support workers is to eliminate the work permit or even the borders issue. People could come and go whenever they want with their families or by themselves. A single answer would be very difficult.
Alejandro:
When we make calls to abolish the program itself, what we're getting at is it's not simply a situation of a tweak here or a tweak there would transform the way the program is functioning. There is at the root of it a necessity to make these workers dependent, exploitable and to put all the power in the hands of the employer and the governments. As long as these power dams continue to be in place, and Canadian companies continue to reap profits, and destroy Latin American communities, this dynamic will continue to occur. The program feeds off that.
MID:
Are there any actions that residents of Canada can take to help?
Alejandro:
No person who lives in so-called Canada is exempt from being related to this issue. Whether it's the food we eat, the trees on the sidewalk, the flowers we gift, migrant farm workers are involved in every single moment in society, social life.
Alexandra:
Migrant workers are the best consumers of several things. Financial institutions benefit from all these thousands of our workers opening bank accounts, shopping at stores and fast food companies, using businesses and services. They don't just come as workers, they also pay salaries, they pay taxes, they contribute to EI to CPP. They contribute hugely to the economy, not only to the food system, but to every aspect of life here. There's an awareness that we need to build to be able to see them as brothers and sisters that are in the same struggle as workers in other industries.
Alejandro:
Aspects of our work as Canadians, or settlers, or immigrants is to join in the indigenous resistance against ongoing colonization. Join the struggles and to continue to push for a society that does not oppress, but rather liberates. Pushing for a working class and indigenous movement.
Thank you, Jesse, Gabe, Alejandro, and Alexandra, for generously sharing your experiences with us.
Written by Caid Dow.
