Canada ups immigrant intake to 500,000 a year
From: IRCC
Image credit: Gabriel Tovar on Unsplash
The Canadian economy has experienced one of the fastest recoveries from COVID-19 among advanced economies, but is now facing critical labour market shortages causing uncertainty for Canadian businesses and workers.
Canada’s 2023–2025 Immigration Levels Plan embraces immigration as a strategy to help businesses find workers and to attract the skills required in key sectors – including health care, skilled trades, manufacturing and technology – to manage the social and economic challenges Canada will face in the decades ahead.
Last year Canada welcomed over 405,000 newcomers – the most ever in a single year. Targets in the new levels plan have been set at 465,000 permanent residents in 2023, 485,000 in 2024 and 500,000 in 2025. The plan also brings an increased focus on attracting newcomers to different regions of the country, including small towns and rural communities.
Highlights of the levels plan include
• A long-term focus on economic growth, with just over 60 per cent of admissions in the economic class by 2025.
• Using new features in the Express Entry system to welcome newcomers with the required skills and qualifications in sectors facing acute labour shortages such as, health care, manufacturing, building trades and STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math).
• Increases in regional programs to address targeted local labour market needs, through the Provincial Nominee Program, the Atlantic Immigration Program, and the Rural and Northern Immigration Pilot.
• Reuniting more families faster
• Ensuring that at least 4.4 per cent of new permanent residents outside Quebec are Francophone
• Support for global crises by providing a safe haven to those facing persecution, including by expanding the Economic Mobility Pathways Pilot.
“Canada’s Building Trades Unions are pleased with the announcement to increase immigration levels in Canada,” said Sean Strickland, Executive Director of Canada’s Building Trades Union (CBTU). “Historically it has been through immigration that we have been able to grow our workforce, fill our union halls and build Canada’s infrastructure. Increased economic immigration is an important step to addressing labour availability across the country and we look forward to continuing to work closely with Minister Fraser and the federal government to find the solutions we need going forward.”
A few quick facts:
• Immigration accounts for almost 100% of Canada’s labour force growth, and, by 2032, it’s projected to account for 100% of Canada’s population growth.
• Canada’s aging population means that the worker-to-retiree ratio is expected to shift from 7 to 1 50 years ago to 2 to 1 by 2035.
• During the 2021 Census, nearly 1 in 4 people counted were or had been a landed immigrant or permanent resident in Canada, the highest proportion since Confederation and the largest proportion among G7 countries.
• Just over 1.3 million new immigrants settled permanently in Canada from 2016 to 2021, the highest number of recent immigrants recorded in a Canadian census.
• The levels plan takes into account extensive engagement with provincial and territorial representatives, as well as public opinion research and stakeholder consultations.
• The Action Plan for Official Languages – 2018-2023: Investing in Our Future provided nearly $500 million over five years in support of official languages, including $40.8 million for Francophone immigration initiatives.
• Under the Canada-Quebec Accord, Quebec establishes its own immigration levels.