Working as a farmer in Canada. Salary and opportunity for permanent residency
You guys often ask me how to find a job in agriculture in Canada. And I just found a hero – this is Yuri from Ukraine, from Kharkov, he is a mechanical engineer who has traveled halfway around the world, worked everywhere, and ended up settling on life in Canada.
— Hi Alex, hi guys! My name is Yuri Drokin, I'm from Kharkov, Ukraine. I studied at the Petro Vasilenko Agricultural University majoring in Mechanical Engineering.
During all these years that I studied at university, I visited a lot of countries: England, Denmark, Switzerland, America, Australia. At first there were student organizations at the university, and when the options with them ended, I found other organizations that have more opportunities. These companies work around Ukraine with both students and other people, signing professional contracts related to immigration. About that a little further.
Watch the video interview with Yuri
I will tell you about the types of agriculture for students. You have to be a student of a university, college or technical school, be an agrarian, like me, and then you will succeed. There are organizations which promote this, help you. In general, there are a lot of these companies in Ukraine, but I know two that compete with each other, they are big. You only need to get certificates from the university, take a language test, contact them (maybe even talk to a representative of the company), they can help you with this. Applying isn't particularly difficult, it's very straightforward everywhere. When you are a student, the roads are open to you.
— That is, you can work if you study, for example, at a Ukrainian university, and then go for a part-time job on a certain course?
— It all starts after the 2nd year.
— Yeah, cool, actually!
— You will have to either take an academic leave, or agree somehow, i.e. it's all interconnected. These companies work with universities, it is just for agrarians, i.e. there is a big opportunity.
If you got in as a student, then you can procrastinate further, yes, dedicate other people to your plans, they will tell you how to do it all: apply for studies, work visa, Marriage and all the rest.
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Of all the countries I've been to, the one that pays the most is probably Australia. In second place I would probably say Canada. In Australia, when I worked on a dairy farm, I was paid $700 for two weeks, so it was $1,400.
— Australian dollars?
— Australian dollars. It was already clean money. I was charged for accommodation and food. Then I worked on a banana farm, the wages there started at $700 to $3,000 to $4,000.
Sydney, Australia
— $3,000 to $4,000 a month?
— Yes, you could earn somewhere between $3,000 and $4,000 a month. There are different salaries depending on how you get there: either you go to a grain farm or a dairy farm. I won't say that I came as a student, I came on a work visa, and I started at $16 an hour.
— Guys, 16 Canadian dollars an hour is less than American dollars an hour. Pay attention to that!
— But it's a start. I think it's great for Canada. Neither more nor less, which is exactly what it is. And as time goes on, of course, things increase.
— Well, you're in Canada now. What province are you in?
— I'm in the province of Saskatchewan.
— Tell me, have you even finished your studies at a Ukrainian university or not? Or do you already travel to other countries? Because somehow I see such dark spots in your history.
— Yeah, there's a kind of a gap in all this. So, look, I was at university, as I say, for 10 years. I studied there for 5 years, I got into the master's program (I had to study for the 6th year or something). I went to Denmark, that was my 3rd trip. After 2 years I came back from Denmark. And I just got lucky, I found a contract in America. I came to the university, they gave me a certificate that I was a student. I didn't even know I was going to get expelled. When I came after America, I wanted to go to Australia. I went to get a certificate and a staff member said to me, "Look, I remember you, but you haven't been a student for a long time. They looked into it and it turned out that I had been expelled for about 5 years. In general, I was transferred to a specialist, they said: "Come on, you're a student, finish university, and that was it. I again went to a specialist, finished my exams. In general, I wrote my diploma, graduated in the summer, finished my last year of studies, and just in 2013 I left for Australia.
Specifically in Canada, there are two great areas: dairy and grain farms, so these two areas are so popular. So I had a dairy farm, I used to work in Denmark, and that experience kind of helped me a lot.
Basically, companies want you to have at least 1 year of experience within the last 5 years. From the moment I started contacting them until I left it was about 10 months, i.e. in 10 months I had already left. They found me a contract, I had an interview with a farmer, made all the documents I needed. I already had everything, everything translated. Please, take everything and send it.
Then I came to Canada under the Saskatchewan SINP program, i.e. it is a working contract for 2 years for dairy farms. I came to the farm, and then the most interesting thing started: they told me there was no work and sent me to a stone quarry. I worked there for about 3 months. There were quarry excavators, dump trucks, crushing machines.
— Did the recruitment agency let you down like that or who let you down, cheated you?
— That's just the kind of farmer I ended up with.
— It wasn't the agency's fault, it was the farmer's?
— Well you know, I can't blame the agency for that, because I had a certain agreement with it: they would help me to go exactly to the farm, and what are the conditions there... It's very hard to find a contract for a farm and you have to cling to the first one that comes along. Having actually been here for some time, I understand that farmers here are just not honey.
— Did it pay well?
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