Looking for a job that is in demand, hands-on and requires less than a year of schooling? Quebec is facing a shortage of butchers and a local vocational school is trying to fix that.
The PACC Career Centre in Montreal is training the next generation of carvers in the food industry, but there aren’t enough students to meet the number of vacant jobs. The Lester B. Pearson School Board estimates that nearly 40 per cent of butchers across the province will retire in the coming decade.
“There is a lot of job openings for sure because a lot of our older butchers are retiring and the shortage in that being is that we’re not producing enough students to fill those positions,” Christina Friesen, a retail butchery teacher at the PACC Career Centre said in an interview Tuesday.
“In a way the shortage is because nobody is wanting to come in and take the program or they don’t understand how easy and how good of a job you can actually get from it.”
In Quebec, the Lester B. Pearson School Board is the only school service centre that offers a retail butchery program in English. The eight-month program is almost mostly hands-on work, an aspect that student Josh Morin-Surette enjoys.
“A lot of people want to make quick money these days, sit behind a desk. And office jobs are becoming a little more popular,” he said. “Personally, I get to work with my hands.”
Morin-Surette started the program in August. His long-term goal is to own his own farm and farm-to-table business.
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“This is the first step to making that happen for me,” he said.
The school says if more young people don’t start taking up the art of butchery, there could be fewer meat stalls at markets and fewer services at grocery stores. The Canadian Meat Council has described the labour shortages as a “crisis” in the meat processing industry. It estimates there are nearly 10,000 empty butcher stations across the country.
In recent years, some future butchers were even paid to study because of a Quebec government program subsidizing fields with labour shortages. The Lester B. Pearson School Board says it provides funding for out-of-province and international butchery students who need to relocate.
“It’s more of a dying trade,” Morin-Surette said. “And in the next few decades we’re going to lose 40 per cent of our butchers and I mean…when there are no butchers you can’t just go to the grocery store and buy a steak, buy a pork chop, you know?
“You need someone to do it.”
At PACC, the program also includes placements for students to hone their craft and get job experience. The school says after their 900-hour training program, students are ready to hit the workforce.
“They’re learning a way of life. They’re learning to service people. They’re learning to build relationships with people. So it’s a lot more than just the carcass and the meat,” PACC assistant director Caroline Mueller said.
Some students enrolled at the school see it as part of the path toward working in a prestigious Michelin star restaurant.
Maxime Guillet decided to pursue retail butchery after studying cooking and gastronomy. He says he has learned about meat muscle divisions, osteology, the equipment and how to make a living.
“It’s a great opportunity, right? Everywhere is looking for people,” Guillet said. “So it’s a business that you can really flourish in. And a lot of butchers are trying to put their best foot forward to teach kind of a new generation of butchers.”
Teachers note that butchers can “constantly be working full time” if they choose. While many start at minimum wage at the beginning of their careers, Frisen says their salary can reach $30 per hour.
“For me, I think it’s a perfect career,” she said.
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