Today, the Honourable Sean Fraser, Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, tabled the 2022‒2024 Immigration Levels Plan. The Plan aims to help the Canadian economy recover by fueling post-pandemic growth.
In 2021, Canada welcomed more than 405,000 new permanent residents—the most immigrants in a single year in Canada’s history. Despite having regained many of the jobs lost during the pandemic, there are still hundreds of thousands of positions in all sectors waiting to be filled. Immigration already accounts for almost 100% of labour force growth, and with 5 million Canadians set to retire by the end of this decade, the economic need for increased Immigration has never been higher.
To ensure Canada has the workers it needs to fill critical labour market gaps and support a strong economy into the future, the 2022–2024 Immigration Levels Plan aims to continue welcoming immigrants at a rate of about 1% of Canada’s population, including 431,645 permanent residents in 2022, 447,055 in 2023, and 451,000 in 2024. Nearly 60% of new immigrants to Canada will be in the Economic Class (i.e. skilled workers, skilled tradespeople, provincial nominees, business immigrants).
To support these increased levels, the Government of Canada plans to modernize Canada’s Immigration system and reduce inventories to create predictable processing times for Immigration Applications.