In 2020, there were 278,762 employees in the agriculture sector, a decrease of 0.3% from 2019.
The horticulture industry hired the most employees per operation on average in 2020, with 25.3 employees in greenhouse, nursery and floriculture production, 17.5 employees in vegetable and melon farming, and 12.5 employees in fruit and tree nut farming.
More than half (51.7%) of all employees in the agriculture sector were seasonal employees in 2020. The greenhouse, nursery and floriculture production industry hired the most seasonal employees, accounting for 21.7% of all seasonal employees.
Data from 2016 to 2019 are also available.
Note to readers
The number of employees was derived from T4 slips produced by agricultural businesses identified by the Agriculture Taxation Data Program. The full-time, part-time or seasonal employee categories were derived from their employment income compared with the median wage of agricultural workers in their industry as reported in the Labour Force Survey, as well as the monthly employee account reported by agricultural businesses through payroll deductions and payments.
Starting with the 2020 reference year, a farm is defined as an operation that produces at least one agricultural product and will report revenue and/or expenses for that agricultural production to the Canada Revenue Agency, as opposed to the previous definition based on the intention to sell agricultural commodities. Data prior to 2020 have been revised to align with the most recent definition.
Data for this series are subject to revision up to five years prior to the current reference year.
Today's release on estimates of agricultural employees is part of Statistics Canada's AgZero modernization project. This project uses leading-edge methods, data integration and advanced technologies to reduce the response burden on farmers to as close to zero as possible.
Contact information
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