Keith Alexander, left, and Adolphus Joseph are among the migrant workers who say they are owed money by Ghesquiere Plant Farm near Simcoe, Ont. (Joan Leishman/CBC)

Migrant workers at a farm near Simcoe, Ont., say they are owed tens of thousands of dollars after their employer ran into financial trouble and left the country without paying them.

The 136 workers came to Ghesquiere Plant Farm from Mexico, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica and Barbados. They are among the 20,000 migrant workers who come to Ontario every year to plant and harvest fruit, vegetables and other crops — work that, at $10.25 an hour, most Canadians don't want.

"I feel very disappointed, especially here in Canada," said Keith Alexander, a 53-year-old from Trinidad who has been coming to Canada for 20 years as a farm labourer.

"This is the first time ever it happened, and that's not good at all."

The farm's Mexican workers arrived in April. They say they were paid early in the season, but then their paycheques started arriving late and, about three weeks ago, stopped coming altogether.

Now, the Mexican workers say they are being told by their consulate to go home and not to expect any more pay.

Last month, the farm, which grows and sells strawberry and raspberry plants and has been experiencing financial problems all season, recruited even more foreign workers. The workers had finished their contracts on farms elsewhere and were offered a few more weeks of work before their visas ran out.

The workers said they were never told the farm was in financial trouble.

Now, they say they're each owed anywhere from a few hundred dollars to almost $2,000.

Planned sales of plants in U.S. never materialized

This fall, the farm filed a notice of intention to get protection from its creditors so that it could restructure to try to stay afloat. It obtained financing from Century Services, a financial services company, in October to harvest its strawberry plants and planned to sell them in California.

'It's an extraordinary, unfortunate situation.'—Tammy Kemp, Century Services

"Sales haven't materialized for the plants shipped to California," said Tammy Kemp, director of risk and compliance at Century Services. "We were told there was a shortage of berry plants, but there is an abundance of plants, so there are not the sales the company had anticipated.

"It's an extraordinarily unfortunate situation."

Kemp said her company has been unable to contact the farm's owner, Carl Ghesquiere, who initially travelled to California to arrange the sale of the plants and has not returned.

Farm manager Holly Pierre said the farm has serious money problems and she doesn't know when the owner will return. The farm's day-to-day operations are in the hands of Century Services, she said.

"We closed the doors last week; there's no more work," said Pierre, who also hasn't been paid. "I can't pay them for the work they've already accumulated, and there's no way to go forward."

Adolphus Joseph, 52, depends on the money he makes on Canadian farms to support his wife and raise and educate six children in Trinidad, three in university.

"It's the wages I am concerned about," he said. The farm owes him several hundred dollars.

"Christmas [is] coming up; I need some money," he said, as he ate his lunch of beans, rice and chicken in a run-down bunkhouse.

Little protection for farm workers

Government officials who act as liaisons with the farm workers are making arrangements to fly the workers home this week. Some have already left.

'We put money in the farmers' pockets as well as in our pockets, and we should be looked after a lot, lot better.'— Francis Gibson, migrant worker from Barbados

Many of the workers, such as Francis Gibson, 46, from Barbados, want to return as farm labourers next year. Gibson has been coming to Canada for 18 years but says there should be more safeguards to protect workers from unscrupulous employers.

In Ontario, foreign farm workers can't organize or join unions. Even domestic farm workers have little protection under the law.

"This is the 21st century," Gibson said. "No person should be treated the way we've been treated."

"As farm workers, we come into your country, we put money in the farmers pockets as well as in our pockets, and we should be looked after a lot, lot better."