Canada’s Atlantic Provinces’ are being increasingly chosen by Immigrants to settle permanently. A new three-year research project now looking forward to settle these newcomers permanently in the region. The research named ‘The People Imperative’ which is led by Public Policy Forum, says that a large chunk of Immigrants coming and settling in Atlantic region of Canada is through Provincial Nomination Programs (PNPs) of Atlantic region’s four provinces- Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Labrador, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island (PEI).
The Report states that “Recent strong growth in immigration to the region is due to expanded use of the PNP — in particular for economic reasons’’.
Two of these programs- Prince Edward’s PNP and Nova Scotia PNP also has an Express Entry aligned stream. In this year, Prince Edward PNP has already opened twice issuing invitations to more than 130 candidates from the Express Entry pool. These selected candidates also gets additional 600 CRS score to claim.
The rest of the regions has following candidates invited in the past year 2017: Nova Scotia welcomed 4,515, New Brunswick’s 3,650, PEI’s 2,350 and Newfoundland and Labrador’s 1,170.
Now, the main cause of trouble in front of the region is immigrants are not staying here and thus, not contributing in the growth.
“As a wave of people reach retirement age, the population is poised for a steep labour force decline, threatening economic stability,” the report states.
The report also suggests seven recommendations to make room for improvementsso that newcomers to stay back in Canada’s Atlantic Provinces, which are currently facing an “existential crisis” as a result of combination of a aging population, low productivity and natural resource depletion.
Amongstmany top motives why immigrants leave the Atlantic region are-superior job opportunities and educational prospectsat bigger and smarter cities like Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver. These cosmopolitan cities also offer an enhanced lifestyle and cultural amenities through which immigrants are more likely to feel at home.