Canada Reports Immigration Expectations Through 2024 and Beyond

Introduction:

People looking to start over continue to find Canada to be an appealing destination due to its welcoming immigration policies and diverse cultural landscape. To address demographic, social, and economic demands, the Canadian government often reassesses and modifies its immigration goals. Let’s examine Canada’s immigration policies and anticipated growth as we approach 2024.

Recent announcements regarding immigration from Canada offer some indication as to how many immigrants may be granted entry into the country in the upcoming year and beyond. The goal of 485,000 new immigrants will be the same for Canada in 2024 when it comes to immigration levels. Canada aims to accept 500,000 new immigrants annually in 2025 and 2026. As a comparison, America is ten times larger than Canada and has historically welcomed 1,250,000 immigrants annually on average.

1. Approximately 281,135 immigrants under the economic class, or 58% of the annual target, will be welcomed by Canada. If we dissect that figure even further, the Express Entry goal for 2024 is 110,700 admissions as permanent residents. This implies that the primary economic class admissions pathway to Canada will once again be Express Entry.

2. Aiming for 114,000 immigrants, or 24% of all admissions, is the family class target. The goal for the Parents and Grandparents Program (PGP) is 32,000 admissions, while the goal for Spousal, Partner, and Children sponsorship is 82,000 admissions by 2024.

3. 89,865 immigrants, or roughly 19% of all admissions, will be the humanitarian admission targets. Refugees, protected individuals, and those admitted for compassionate, humanitarian, or other reasons are all included in these totals.

4. 110,000 immigrants are the goal of the provinces’ Provincial Nominee Program (PNP).

In order to guarantee that this component of their immigration system is also sustainable, the government also intends to take steps during the course of the upcoming year to recalculate the number of admissions for temporary residents.

In contrast, Canada uses an express entry system of numerical sorting to determine which immigrants should be granted permanent residence based on their potential economic and social benefit; American immigration policy, on the other hand, is more family oriented.

An Innovative Approach

Three main objectives make up the new strategy, An Immigration System for Canada’s Future:

Make the environment more hospitable for visitors
Match immigration to the needs of the labor market
Create a thorough and well-coordinated growth plan.

As a result of the housing shortage and affordability crisis that Canada is currently facing, multiple polls have shown that Canadians are less enthusiastic about immigration than they were in previous years. However, in light of the low birth rate and the impending retirement of millions of Canadian workers as they approach 65, the Immigration and Refugee Committee (IRCC) continues to maintain high immigration targets due to a shortage of skilled labor. As things stand, 98% of Canada’s population growth can be attributed to immigration, according to Statistics Canada’s most recent population estimate.

Additionally, Quebec recently presented its plan for immigration levels in 2024 and 2025. The only province in Canada that has control over its annual admission targets for permanent residents is Quebec. In 2024, the province declared its intention to accept 50,000 new immigrants. It has been stated that passing a French language exam will be a requirement for all economic immigrants to Quebec. Prominent observers on immigration have forecast a challenging path ahead when it comes to enforcing this requirement on the immigrant community.

Broad-ranging Policy Areas

It is challenging to identify which immigration issues are of utmost importance to the Canadian government because of the immigration strategy’s vast and varied details. A large portion of the announcement is a compilation of previously released material. Examples of this include the talent strategy, which aims to strengthen the position of the tech sector in North America by providing an open work permit to holders of H-1B visas; the digital nomad strategy, which promotes Canada as a destination for remote work where workers can stay indefinitely if they receive a job offer; and the creation of new opportunities for highly skilled individuals to come to Canada to work, whether or not they have a job offer.

Housing and health care, lowering wait times and enhancing services, creating a cutting-edge online immigration application processing system, managing refugees, encouraging rural development, encouraging francophone immigrants, and honoring indigenous values are some of the other topics addressed.

The immigration system in the United States also addresses the majority of these issues.

Lack of Clarity

Once more, though, it’s unclear what should come first. In the past, Canadian governments have proudly announced new immigration projections but have been vague about the specifics of their programs. These announcements also follow suit in that regard. In all federal immigration programs, setting and meeting processing targets would be a particularly positive development. Yet the government carefully stays away from making any such promises.

The looming issue of over 100 million uprooted migrants—displaced due to war, poverty, hunger, violence, and ecological disruptions like earthquakes, droughts, and climate change—represents a growing area of international concern in the immigration field. The majority of these migrants are not refugees, but some are. Far too frequently, this area is addressed by refugee law and policy, which was not intended to cover the entirety of the issue. There isn’t a clear, comprehensive international policy on how to handle this issue, and Canada could be a major player in solving it. The United States ought to be at the forefront of this field as well.