Olymel and the CSN-affliliated Syndicat des travailleurs de Olymel Vallee-Jonction (STOVJ) announced Sunday afternoon they had reached a new agreement, on which the union said it will “quickly” call a general assembly of members to vote on ratification.

Olymel, the meat packing arm of Sollio Co-operative, said Sunday it would put off until Wednesday (Sept. 1) its recently announced plan to cancel the evening shift at the pork plant at Vallee-Jonction, pending the outcome of the employees’ vote on the deal.

Dismissal letters were otherwise due to be sent Monday (Aug. 30) to “more than 500” of the plant’s 1,050-odd unionized employees, the company said Sunday.

Olymel’s Aug. 24 decision to scrap the evening shift and lay off its assigned workers “is therefore suspended to allow the union leaders to organize a general assembly of its members and will remain suspended until the vote,” Paul Beauchamp, the company’s first vice-president, said in a release.

Cancelling the evening shift “had become necessary in the prospect of an indefinite continuation of the strike,” he said, but the “difficult decision will be abandoned in the event of a vote in favour of the agreement in principle reached today, which would receive a favourable recommendation from the union executives.”

The strike, he added, “entered its fifth month yesterday and has had extremely negative economic impacts on the company and the region” and still could lead to market-weight hogs being euthanized and put “several” hog farmers in “unacceptable” breeding conditions.

Sunday’s agreement in principle followed a “blitz” of negotiations held since Friday between the company and union, led by the province’s appointed special mediator, Jean Poirier.

Provincial Labour Minister Jean Boulet said Sunday on Twitter the mediation blitz “has borne fruit,” adding that the new agreement would go to an employee vote on Tuesday (Aug. 31).

Both the company and union said Sunday they wouldn’t comment further on the proposed deal until after the employees’ general assembly.

Sunday’s agreement in principle is the second such deal to be reached between the union and management this month. The first agreement, announced Aug. 13, went to an employee vote Aug. 17 and was rejected with a nay vote of 57 per cent.

Following Olymel’s Aug. 24 ultimatum, union representatives said it wasn’t the first time the company had raised the possibility of job cuts at that facility to reach a deal with workers.

Boulet last week had proposed taking the dispute to arbitration, but the STOVJ said it would reject that option in favour of a negotiated agreement.

Les Eleveurs de porcs du Quebec, the province’s hog producer group, was quoted last week in Quebec media as saying the backlog of market-weight hogs in the province has reached about 166,000 head.

The group has said previously it was working with Olymel to try and manage the backlog, by shipping animals to slaughter outside Quebec and/or selling off piglets to free up barn space.

The plant at Vallee-Jonction, about 60 km southeast of Quebec City, has operated since 1965 and has been part of the meats division of what’s now Sollio since 1975.

The plant has capacity to process about 35,000 hogs per week and produces boned products, pork cuts and fresh chilled pork, mostly for export markets, mainly Japan, the U.S. and Mexico. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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The Syndicat des travailleurs d’Olymel Vallee-Jonction-CSN — which represents over 1,000 striking workers at Olymel’s plant Vallee-Jonction, about 60 km southeast of Quebec City — said in a release Friday it regretted that negotiations with the company would not resume before the week of July 19.

That’s because the company “has no availabilities” before that time, the union said.

In the same release, Syndicat president Martin Maurice said the union had been willing to enter an agreement in principle with Olymel during meetings held Thursday and Friday, and had made a counter-proposal during Thursday’s meeting.

But the company instead returned to the table Friday seeking more concessions on the issue of vacation time, he said, adding it’s evident the company doesn’t really want to settle and that its strategy is to “divide and starve us.”

The strike in recent weeks saw farmer organizations including the Union des producteurs agricoles (UPA) and Eleveurs de porcs du Quebec (EPQ) join calls for a quick resolution, given not only the costs to hog producers but all that’s been done so far to prevent ruptures in food supply chains during the COVID-19 pandemic.

UPA, in a release June 10, said it wasn’t picking sides in the labour dispute, but noted consolidation and concentration in the meat processing sector have left the supply chain vulnerable to strikes and lockouts alike. Some minimum level of work should continue to prevent waste and market disruption, the general farm organization said.

Olymel, in a separate release June 10, said it’s “sensitive to the concerns” of the EPQ, but emphasized the Synidcat was responsible for calling a strike and for seeking wage increases that “would have put this plant out of step with its competitors and jeopardized its viability.”

The company, an arm of Quebec co-operative Sollio, also warned UPA and EPQ at the time that any “untimely intervention by third parties” in conciliation with the union “could be detrimental to its progress and to the prospect of a quick resolution.”

When the strike began April 28, Olymel said it had “redirected” purchased hogs in Ontario and Quebec to other slaughter plants — particularly in the U.S. and Ontario, so as to free up space in its Quebec plants to handle hogs meant for Vallee-Jonction.

Olymel’s four other Quebec hog slaughter plants, meanwhile, “are operating at maximum capacity despite labour constraints and applying strict sanitary measures,” the company said June 10.

The company also granted June 10 that the strike “is putting upward pressure on the number of hogs ready for slaughter, which has now reached 90,000,” but is “exploring all options that could help reduce the number of hogs waiting for slaughter and avoid euthanasia at the farm.”

The Vallee-Jonction plant, in business since 1965, today has capacity to slaughter about 35,000 hogs per week. The plant in 2016 added a ham deboning line that was expected to bring its total workforce to about 1,200.

According to Olymel, the plant produces boned products, pork cuts and fresh chilled pork, mostly for export markets, mainly Japan, the U.S. and Mexico. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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The Syndicat des travailleurs d’Olymel Vallee-Jonction-CSN, which represents over 1,000 staff at Vallee-Jonction, about 60 km southeast of Quebec City, called an “indefinite” strike effective Wednesday morning, the union said in a release Thursday.

Quebec’s hog producer organization, Les eleveurs de porcs du Quebec, has reworked its weight classification charts in response to the work stoppage at the plant.

The organization was quoted Thursday in Le Bulletin des agriculteurs as encouraging producers to prioritize their heaviest hogs when preparing to ship slaughter-weight animals.

In the union’s release, STOVJ president Martin Maurice said relations between the union and company have been tense for a long time, but workers have until now remained on the job throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, “sometimes at risk to their health.”

The last strike at the plant ended in 2015 with a six-year contract. The union presented wage demands for a new contract April 19 and were promised that management would come back with a comprehensive submission covering financial and non-financial matters, Maurice said.

Since then, he said, management has demanded that contract talks go to conciliation even before responding to the union’s submissions and has “now refused to meet with us on the scheduled dates.”

The union also alleges a high rate of employee turnover at the plant since 2015, with over 1,800 people having been hired and over 1,700 leaving.

Alexandre Boileau-Laviolette, president of Federation du commerce-CSN, said several current employees in a survey indicated they would also want to leave if contract talks don’t lead to improved working conditions at the plant.

Olymel, he said, hasn’t demonstrated “the slightest recognition” of its workers’ commitment during the pandemic.

The union last October had pressed for Olymel to temporarily shut the Vallee-Jonction plant for at least two weeks following the death of a 65-year-old worker from COVID-19.

Olymel’s Red Deer, Alta. and Yamachiche, Que. hog slaughter plants have seen temporary shutdowns in the wake of COVID outbreaks at those facilities.

The Vallee-Jonction plant, in business since 1965, became part of the meats division of La Coop federee (now Sollio) in 1975 and today has capacity to slaughter about 35,000 hogs per week. The plant in 2016 added a ham deboning line that was expected to bring its total workforce to about 1,200.

The plant, Olymel said, produces boned products, pork cuts and fresh chilled pork, mostly for export markets, mainly Japan, the U.S. and Mexico. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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Le Syndicat des travailleurs d’Olymel Vallee-Jonction-CSN said Wednesday the death of a worker earlier this week led it to demand that the company shut the Olymel plant at Vallee-Jonction — about 60 km south of Quebec City — for at least two weeks.

Quebec media on Wednesday quoted union officials as saying a 65-year-old employee had been off work since Friday last week with symptoms, was confirmed positive Tuesday for COVID-19 and died hours later.

Local union president Martin Maurice — who was quoted in local media Wednesday as saying up to 80 Vallee-Jonction workers have tested positive for the coronavirus — said in a release that the union had called for protective measures for workers since the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic began.

However, he said, the union this summer had to call again on the company — the meat packing arm of Quebec ag co-operative Sollio — over its “relaxation” of certain sanitary measures put in place to prevent an outbreak. The company had resumed overtime and cancelled a 10-minute buffer period between shifts, he said.

Also, Maurice said a number of “subcontractors” now work at the plant and added it’s not known whether those workers are following protective measures regarding moving from one work site to another.

David Bergeron-Cyr , president of the Federation du commerce-CSN (Confederation des syndicats nationaux), said the risks of working at Olymel plants are well known, because past experience has demonstrated slaughter plants, with close proximity between work stations, have an “abnormally elevated” rate of COVID transmission.

Essential workers shouldn’t have to assume such risk, he said in the union’s release Wednesday.

The Vallee-Jonction plant, in business since 1965, became part of the meats division of La Coop federee (now Sollio) in 1975 and today has capacity to slaughter about 35,000 hogs per week. The plant in 2016 added a ham deboning line that was expected to bring its total workforce to about 1,200.

Olymel previously shut its hog slaughter plant at Yamachiche, Que. for two weeks starting in late March after a COVID outbreak among employees there. The company’s hog plant at Red Deer, Alta. reported one positive COVID case in August but did not halt operations.

Other livestock slaughter and processing plants across the country have been reporting outbreaks in recent weeks, including the Exceldor Co-operative poultry plant at Blumenort, Man. and the J+L Beef plant at Surrey, B.C.

Local media are also reporting an outbreak among staff at the Fearmans Pork plant at Burlington, Ont. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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The plant, which has about 200 unionized workers, represented by le Syndicat des travailleuses et travailleurs de Sucre Lantic (FC-CSN), will resume “all production activities” and return to business as usual “as soon as possible,” the company said in a release.

Members of the plant’s operation and maintenance group had been on strike since Tuesday, following a breakdown in talks that had been underway since March. Rogers’ previous three-year contract with FC-CSN expired at the end of February.

“We are extremely pleased that, together, we were able to find a compromise in order to reach a satisfactory outcome for both parties,” John Holliday, CEO of Rogers subsidiary Lantic, which operates the Montreal plant, said Sunday.

“Over the next few months, we will be working hard at strengthening our relationship with the union and its members.”

The refinery has capacity to produce about 440,000 tonnes per year of sugar. A Rogers spokesperson had told Reuters on Tuesday that the company’s contingency plan would have included dipping into inventory and/or shifting production to its other facilities.

Rogers also has a cane refinery at Vancouver and a sugar beet processing facility at Taber, Alta., about 50 km east of Lethbridge. — AGCanada.com Network

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The company is implementing contingency measures to minimize disruption to customers. “There’s inventory, the company’s (other) facilities and other alternatives,” said a spokesman for the company, declining to give further details.

The refinery, operated by Lantic Inc., has capacity to produce about 440,000 tonnes per year of sugar and is a wholly owned subsidiary of Rogers. It has about 200 unionized workers.

Talks between Lantic and the union began in March after a three-year contract expired.

Le Syndicat des travailleuses et travailleurs de Sucre Lantic (FC-CSN), which represents the striking workers, said in a release Tuesday the outstanding issues included pension contributions and company use of subcontractors.

Protecting jobs is a key point for the union, president Marc l’Heureux said in the release, noting Lantic cut 59 jobs at the plant in 2014.

U.S. and Canadian industry players said the disruption at the key Montreal facility could cause supply ructions if it continued for a substantial length of time, given the importance of the Lantic refinery to the Canadian market.

Rogers also has a cane refinery at Vancouver and a sugar beet processing facility at Taber, Alta., about 50 km east of Lethbridge.

— Reporting for Reuters by Josephine Mason and Chris Prentice in New York. Includes files from AGCanada.com Network staff.

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Out of about 940 striking workers at the Vallee-Jonction hog plant represented by CSN (Confederation des syndicats nationaux), 816 met Friday at nearby Tring-Jonction and voted about 70 per cent by secret ballot in favour of the new deal.

Under the deal, brokered by provincial labour ministry conciliator Jean Nolin, workers are to get raises totalling two per cent over the first three years and 1.75 per cent over the remaining three years.

The deal also includes a base signing bonus of $800 per employee plus $55 per year of service, and a 14 per cent increase in Olymel’s contributions to the employee insurance plan.

Nolin presented the proposed deal to workers, who’ve been on strike since March 18, at their meeting Friday.

The company and union agreed on a gradual return-to-work protocol which Olymel said Friday will depend on available hog volumes and the “product mix.”

The Vallee-Jonction plant has capacity to slaughter up to 35,000 hogs per week and produces boned products, pork cuts and fresh chilled pork, mainly for export markets.

Maintenance and sanitation work at the Vallee-Jonction plant is to begin Friday, Olymel said, as hog supplies are expected to resume Monday evening, followed by slaughtering on Tuesday and butchering operations on Wednesday.

Olymel said its teams are “already hard at work to ensure a supply of hogs at the facility.”

“We are hopeful that, together with our employees and the union leaders, we have found the conditions that will allow this large facility to return to its place in our organization and continue to serve our markets and customers,” Olymel CEO Rejean Nadeau said in the company’s release.

“I am confident that, thanks to the dedication of our teams already on site, we can recover the greater part of the deliveries we were forced to cancel in recent weeks.”

All non-union staff members who were laid off on Monday will be recalled, Olymel said Friday.

Nadeau on Friday also thanked those “who helped minimize the adverse effects that could have arisen from the situation since March 18, and especially to (the provincial hog producers’ association) Les eleveurs de porcs du Quebec and its president David Boissonneault, who spared no effort in mobilizing all industry partners to reduce congestion in the slaughtering process.”

“Despite the threat of plant closure we again faced, we leave this strike with our heads held high, and we’re convinced we’ve obtained the most we could have sought, with the help of the conciliator,” union local president Martin Maurice said in CSN’s release Friday. –– AGCanada.com Network

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The Vallee-Jonction plant’s 940-odd employees represented by CSN (Confederation des syndicats nationaux) walked off the job on March 18.

Union and company officials have been in talks with the provincial conciliator, Jean Nolin, since March 26, the company said.

Nolin has submitted his report to the executive committee for CSN’s Vallee-Jonction local, and has also asked to present it to assembled union members, the union said in a release Wednesday.

CSN said it has called a members’ meeting for Friday at 1 p.m. at nearby Tring-Jonction and won’t comment further before the end of that meeting.

Olymel, in a separate release Wednesday, said its management has also received Nolin’s report and won’t comment further until after the members’ assembly Friday.

In a previous release Sunday, however, Olymel said the union and company had both signed an agreement in principle with a “favourable recommendation” from the provincial conciliator.

But the company also said Sunday that union brass “refuse to recommend” to Vallee-Jonction members that they should vote in favour of the agreement.

Olymel said Sunday the “inexplicable attitude” from the union “can only mean a continuation of the strike at the Vallee-Jonction plant.”

The company, which last week announced layoffs effective March 30 for most of Vallee-Jonction’s non-union staff, said Sunday the strike is “already compromising the resumption of operations, specifically on the second shift.”

The strike “has already led to the cancellation of supply contracts (from Ontario hog producers) that will be difficult to recover unless there is an agreement in the short term,” Olymel said. — AGCanada.com Network

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Workers represented by CSN (Confederation des syndicats nationaux) at Olymel’s Vallee-Jonction hog plant in Quebec’s Beauce region have been on strike since March 18 and last week voted to reject what the company described as its final contract offer.

Olymel said Tuesday it has “no choice but to lay off almost all managers and administrative staff working at this plant” starting March 30.

The company said it tried to relocate the non-union workers to other Olymel facilities but has had to serve layoff notices to about 55 of those employees.

Olymel said Tuesday it has also had to cancel deliveries of nearly 23,000 hogs per week from Ontario, as a move to “stem the glut of slaughtered hogs” after the strike began at Vallee-Jonction, southeast of Quebec City.

Olymel, the meat processing arm of Quebec’s Coop Federee, also operates hog slaughter plants at St-Esprit and Princeville, Que. and Red Deer, Alta., plus six further-processing plants in Quebec and one in Ontario handling products such as hams, bacon and deli meats.

Working with Quebec’s hog producer organization, les Eleveurs de porcs du Quebec, and “other slaughterhouses,” Olymel said Tuesday it has taken “a series of measures to limit adverse consequences” for Quebec hog farmers due to the strike.

Having to cancel hog deliveries from Ontario, however, has already “compromised” the Vallee-Jonction plant’s ability to resume production at full capacity when or if the strike ends, the company said.

The Vallee-Jonction plant has slaughter capacity for about 35,000 pigs per week, shipping fresh chilled pork, pork cuts and boned products mainly for export outside Canada.

Olymel reiterated Tuesday it can’t meet CSN’s “continued unreasonable demands” for wage hikes for the plant’s 950-odd unionized staff “without leaving the market to competitors.”

CSN had no official comment Tuesday but has previously said the Vallee-Jonction workers have seen “minimal” wage hikes since accepting what they described as a 40 per cent rollback in 2007. — AGCanada.com Network

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Olymel’s corporate communications spokesman Richard Vigneault confirmed the workers, represented by CSN (Confederation des syndicats nationaux), went on strike Wednesday evening.

CSN, in a release Thursday, said 841 of the 950-odd workers from the plant at Vallee-Jonction, southeast of Quebec City, came to a special meeting at nearby Tring-Jonction and voted 91.2 per cent by secret ballot to reject Olymel’s offer.

Martin Maurice, president of the CSN local at the Olymel plant, said the workers voted against Olymel’s offer despite “veiled threats” from the company that it would cut back or halt work at the plant.

Vigneault said Thursday the company is ready to work with conciliators from the provincial labour ministry to “redesign” their offer within the same budgetary framework.

Asked whether the plant is at risk of closing or cutting back as a result of the strike, he said the company is concerned it’s going to have to cancel contracts with hog producers.

If that turns out to be the case, he said, “we’re going to have a tough time to get them back later on.”

Olymel said this week it had presented CSN with “positive offers excluding any recovery” despite booking losses in the company’s fresh pork sector in Eastern Canada in the past two years.

The company said its final offer for a three-year contract “provides (for) wages and conditions that are superior to what is available for comparable work elsewhere in the industry in Canada, and even in North America.”

Olymel said its offer calls for a lump-sum payment to employees, a boost in recognition for years of service, yearly wage hikes above the rate of inflation and improved benefits such as insurance and holidays.

Vallee-Jonction workers already get remuneration 10 per cent above what other firms are paying, and would get wages 14 per cent above North American industry scale under the new deal, Olymel said.

CSN, Olymel said, still tabled demands last month for a “37 per cent payroll increase” in the first year of a new contract, increasing to 47 per cent by the end of the contract, which Olymel said would cost the company an additional $18 million.

Maurice previously said the plant’s workers have seen “minimal” wage hikes since agreeing to what he said was a 40 per cent rollback in 2007, while their cost of living has continued to rise. –– AGCanada.com Network

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