A Jamaican seasonal farm worker died last Thursday after collapsing at a farm in Canada.

Roy Walker, 68, departed Jamaica on March 17 for his annual journey to Canada, where he worked at the Sheridan Farms. Less than a week later, he was dead.

According to Walker’s niece, Alisa Williams, Walker’s sudden death has plunged his community of Shooters in Kellits, Clarendon into sadness.

It has also left his family very puzzled and confused as, according to Williams, her uncle appeared to be in “good health” prior to leaving Jamaica less than a week earlier.

“It is really a shock to the entire community because he had just left Jamaica and he seemed to be in good health – although he had a little diabetes; he’s been diabetic for almost 10 years,” Williams told OBSERVER ONLINE.

“He was a very jovial man who loved to sit and socialise when he was not planting his ground – he went to Canada almost every year for the last 20 years for about eight to nine months at a time,” she added.

Williams further shared that the Ministry of Labour was in touch with the family, who are awaiting the result of an autopsy on Walker’s body.

In the meantime, Williams says that the family continues to mourn, noting that the ordeal has been made more difficult by the lack of information so far around his sudden passing.

The Jamaica Liaison Service head office in Toronto declined to comment on the matter, citing that it could not disclose “private information”, when contacted by OBSERVER ONLINE.

Efforts to get a comment from the Ministry of Labour also proved futile up to publication time.