On the Picket Line

Workers go on strike at Cargill’s beef-processing plant in Ontario

By Tony DiFelice
June 17, 2024

GUELPH, Ontario –— Hundreds of workers at the Cargill beef-processing plant here, members of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 175, hit the picket line May 27 the day after an 82% vote against a proposed offer.

Cargill’s Guelph plant is Canada’s largest beef-slaughter plant east of Manitoba, with more than 900 workers. The company has about 8,000 workers nationally. It supplies 55% of the beef in the Canadian market.

Walter Rzeznik, who works as a butcher in the cutting room and has been there 27 years, said, “We go through between 1,700 to 1,800 head of cattle a day, with overtime up to 2,000.” He noted his last name is Polish for “butcher.”

“By speeding up production,” he said, “the company is forcing the butchers to work closer to each other, with less elbow room, increasing the chance of injury.”

Cargill is an international conglomerate with 160,000 employees in 70 countries, and a 2023 revenue of $177 billion. One hundred members of the Cargill-MacMillan family own at least 88% of the company.

Strikers told the Militant the main issue is to win a wage increase that keeps up with inflation.

Hundreds of strikers were lined up all along Dunlop Drive. Rzeznik showed this Militant correspondent the video of a “festival” they had on the picket line, accordion player and all.

The strike is winning solidarity, with other unions joining the picket line and almost constant honks of support from trucks and cars driving by.