Governance Renewal in Agricultural Health and Safety

AgsafeBC serves as the capacity-builder for farmworker safety in BC. The organization grew from the advocacy efforts of Dr. Charan Gill and the Canadian FarmWorkers Union (CFU) that resulted in the creation of the first farming safety standards and the organization (then the Farm and Ranch Safety and Health Association or FARSHA).

Part of the government’s response at the time was to draft rules for agricultural safety and include them in Worksafe BC’s (previously Workers Compensation Board) standards.

The government also funded the co-creation of FARSHA (now AgSafeBC) with strong worker representation. The governance model featured a board that was evenly split between the BC Farm Workers Union and farm employers. A board chair selected by the directors held the balance and was designed to avoid deadlock at the board table.

AgSafeBC came to be the pre-eminent organization reaching farmers and farmworkers with safety advice and instruction and guidance. Farmers came to see AgSafe as a trusted source of information that helped them to prevent injuries and was available during emergencies to provide assistance.

But growth and evolution were stifled, because some board members stayed for decades. Over time and rather than getting mired in conflict, the board became distracted from its purpose. Lacking a strategic focus, the board was unable to envision its own organization as anything than other than what it was. The board also shifted its attention away from strategic issues to operational ones.

The board chair Don Dahr believed that the organization could become something greater, and that it already had an excellent team and leader at its core. He realized that the incapacity of the board to do strategic work would hold the whole organization back.

AgSafe approached think: act consulting to submit a proposal and the board agree to a process that Kyle set out for a 360 evaluation of the board and to provide recommendations.

Think: act diagnosed the issues and recognizing that there was an impending governance crisis due to the board composition, Kyle recommended that the board dissolve itself and that the Society be re-designed with new Constitution and Bylaws. The new bylaws restructured the board to be more representative of the people (farmers and farmworkers) it serves. Importantly, it ensured a strong voice for safety from farmworkers.

The organization also embraced changes to the industry such as the diversity of farmworkers, the growing number of women running farms, and the need to encourage a new generation of farmers. An interim board of farmers and industry associations build a new Constitution and Bylaws, with support from a team inside and outside AgSafeBC

We also helped to re-brand the organization as the “capacity builder” for anyone in the agricultural sector wanting to get involved in governance and change organizations. One of our strategies was to explicitly recruit a mix of experienced board members as well as directors who were inexperienced in governance but who wanted to learn through a “best practice” lens.

The Board made the transition, and AgSafe is now expanding in reach, access and a growing range of services that address the physical and mental/emotional toll of farming on workers and farm owners, in multiple languages. Since rebuilding, AgSafe has more than doubled the number of on-farm visits, expanded its funding streams, and created new programs including emergency preparedness, mental health, and free counseling to the agricultural community throughout BC.  

Dr. Charan Gill sadly passed away on February 2, 2021, after helping AgSafe to transition to its new identity. Beyond his legacy serving the South Asian community through his leadership of the Progressive Intercultural Services Society (PICS), Dr. Gill was an anti-racism advocate and tireless activist in support of the health, safety and rights of all farmworkers.

Charan Gill’s legacy at AgSafe is not just as a visionary and founder. As the board stepped aside to redesign AgSafe, his perspective was that the organization would be more integrated through technology, serve Spanish-speaking farmworkers better, and be better integrated with adjacent industries.

All of those have come about through the efforts, difficult discussions and decisions of anew board that gave rise to a stronger, more resilient and more impactful AgSafe.

It gives me reason to remember, every time I sit down to a delicious meal, how intricately we are connected to the work of passionate and courageous volunteers supporting farm safety so that every worker can come home safely at the end of the day.

To learn more about AgSafe, you can find their website here.

To see what AgSafe has to say about our work, their testimonial is here

If you have a troubling governance issue at your company or organization, or if you just want to talk strategy for your organization, contact me here