A new Career Focus Green Jobs program is offering wage subsidies to help employers with an environmental focus hire new graduates, a federal release says.
The program targets small- and medium-sized businesses to help reduce the cost barriers of hiring new graduates by subsidizing their salary by 50 per cent to a maximum of $13,500 per year. Its purpose is to help employers hire the talent they need and help recent graduates initiate a career.
“Agriculture is a natural fit for this green jobs initiative,” says Portia MacDonald-Dewhirst, executive director of the Canadian Agricultural Human Resource Council (CAHRC). “Canada’s primary producers are the frontline caregivers for much of our nation’s lands and waters and are therefore also the most invested in making sure heathy ecosystems are maintained.”
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To qualify as a green job the job must have a green mandate or the employer needs to have an environmental focus. For example, the job must help reduce the consumption of energy and raw materials; limit greenhouse gas emissions; minimize waste and pollution; and protect and restore ecosystems.
For agriculture, as long as the company meets one of the following specifications they are considered eligible for the program: the farm/company has a sustainable mandate or focus which helps protect and restore ecosystems; it has developed and implemented systems to reduce waste within the industry; it produces organic products which reduce the use of chemicals; it conducts research on the environmental impact and resolutions within the industry; or it is an agricultural manufacturing company that develops equipment that reduces emissions and energy use.
Also eligible may be non-profit environmental organizations; solar and wind technology companies; environmental science centres; watershed and water resource agencies, farms and farming co-ops; conservation organizations; museums and educational institutions; waste management companies; and information technology companies, among others.
The program is being administered by CAHRC partner BioTalent Canada and all applications must be submitted by December 12, 2016 to offset employment costs until June 2017.
