Ontario announces first immigration strategy

Canada, 3rd March: Taking a cue from its shrinking share in Canada immigration, Ontario has announced its first immigration strategy.

Canada’s immigration rules are restricting Ontario from attracting immigrants, said Charles Sousa, Ontario’s Citizenship and Immigration minister.

Ontario launches its own immigration strategy—The creation of first-ever Canada immigration strategy is going to play a vital role in the future of the economy, Mr. Sousa added. In order to enable newcomers in Ontario find jobs and to make immigration provide best results for Ontario economy, a strategy will be developed by a roundtable of experts led by Julia Deans.

Deans happens to be a past CEO of Greater Toronto Civic Action Alliance. The 13-member panel of experts will comprise employers, academics, business leaders and others in the IT and financial sectors. It will suggest ways to the federal government in summer this year to aid development of Ontario’s economy.

Ontario top destination for new immigrants--Ontario is the only Canadian province not having any immigration agreement despite the fact that it is the top destination for new immigrants coming to Canada. The fact that number of newcomers choosing to settle in Ontario has gone down by around 21 percent is a cause of concern. The figures of newcomers settling in Ontario went down to 118,114 in the year 2010 to 148,640 in the year 2001.

Newcomers in Ontario comprise nearly 30 percent of total workforce of this Canadian province. Hence, Ontario must work towards attracting increased number of immigrants to come, live and work here.

And this can be attributed to aggressive marketing strategies adopted by other Canadian provinces along with the aim of Canada to make immigration evenly spread throughout the nation.

Ontario’s PNP remains underutilized—Ontario’s PNP (Provincial Nominee Program) has not reached its optimum potential in terms to attracting newcomers. And this is partly due to the fact that Ontario’s immigration agreement with the Canadian government dates back to 2005.

This has left Ontario far behind the competition for attracting skilled newcomers. The annual quota of Ontario PNP has been limited to 1,000 and this is hurting the province, claims Sousa. New Ontario immigration strategy will be instrumental in shaping discussion with the government of Canada for an immigration agreement.