Canadian immigration: A new study from Statistics Canada says that the Provincial Nominee Program (PNP) has changed a lot about immigration to Canada.
Between 1998 and 2009, the PNP was put in place in all provinces except for Quebec and the Yukon. Its goal was to spread out where economic immigrants lived outside of Canada’s biggest towns and to meet the needs of each province and territory in terms of workers.
Each province and region is in charge of making and running their own PNP. Those who want to apply can do so in a number of different ways.
Even though the streams vary a lot between provinces and territories, there are a few main types, such as workers with job offers, workers without job offers, entrepreneur streams, and foreign student streams.
The PNP keeps growing, and in 2019, there will be 68,000 province nominees in Canada. In that year, the PNP was the biggest program for choosing economic immigrants. It was responsible for 35% of all new immigrants to Canada, which was up from 1% in 2000.
Immigration, Refugees, and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) puts out a new Immigrations Level Plan every year. This plan tells them how to run their business. Canada wants to have 465,00 new legal residents by 2023.
By 2025, this number will rise to 500,000. The Immigration Levels Plan goal for permanent residents under PNP is higher than Express Entry, which is the main economic class route for the federal government. Through the PNP, IRCC hopes to welcome 117,500 permanent residents in 2025.
How economic newcomers are spread out across Canada
The major result of the Statistics Canada study was that economic immigration in Canada became less centralized as the PNP grew. In other words, as the PNP grew, economic immigration in Canada became less centralized.
From 2000, when there were almost no provincial applicants, to 2019, the number of new economic immigrants in each province changed a lot.
During that time, the number of immigrants who wanted to stay in Ontario (mostly Toronto) dropped from 61% to 42%. The number of people going to British Columbia also went down, from 17% to 15%.
The Prairie provinces did very well. The number of newcomers going to Manitoba and Saskatchewan went from almost nothing to about 7%. Together, Alberta and the Atlantic provinces saw a rise in their share, which went from 1% to 7%.
How the qualities of state nominees are changing
As the PNP has changed over time, the kinds of people who are chosen through it have changed a lot.
The most important change was that people were more likely to choose economic refugees who were already making money in Canada. This means that temporary foreign workers became more popular.
From 2002 to 2019, the number of provincial nominees ages 20 to 54 who had been temporary foreign workers went from 6% to 61% and will go up to 72% in 2021.
Research showed that immigrants who had worked temporarily in Canada before had better short-term and long-term job prospects than immigrants who had never worked in Canada before.
There was also a big rise in the number of PNP newcomers who had studied in Canada before they moved there. In 2019, 38% of new PNP immigrants had studied in Canada before coming to the U.S. This is up from 7% in 2010.
Age was another important thing to think about. In the past, the age of immigrants from a province has been getting younger. In 2005, 24% of immigrants were 20–29 years old. In 2019, 38% of immigrants were in that age group.
According to the study, immigrants who are younger tend to do better economically than immigrants who are older, especially in the long run.
As the number of nominees in their 20s went up, the number of main applicants without a spouse or children also went up.
There have been big changes in how well local nominees can speak the official language. In 2005, one out of every five nominees did not speak either English or French.
In 2019, there are almost no nominees who don’t speak English or French when they arrive in Canada. This is likely because most PNP programs now require nominees to speak English or French at a certain level.
From 2005 to 2019, the number of people whose first language is not English or French but who also know English or French rose from 64% to 91%.
Last but not least, there have been changes in the places where economic immigrants come from. In the past, economic immigrants to Canada came from a wide range of countries, with no one country or area being the main source.
However, this is changing. Seventy percent of 2019’s new provincial nominees originated from South Asia, East Asia, or Southeast Asia.
Taking a look ahead
Since the PNP started, there has been a big shift in how new economic immigrants are spread out. The new province nominees have also changed a lot, and most of these changes are for the better when it comes to the economy.
The continued growth of the PNP could continue to feed the trend of more regionally decentralized immigration, which is meant to help Canada better deal with the different demographic and labour market challenges in different parts of the country.
The study shows that the number, patterns of settlement, and traits of provincial nominees change over time, which affects their roles in the workforce and in the population as a whole.
Summary on Canadian immigration:
- The reshaped Canadian immigration
- 68,000 province nominees.
- More temporary foreign workers.
- Geographic dispersion
- Improved language skills.
- Address regional challenges.
