August 6, 2017 – Donald Trump has thrown his presidential weight behind a bill that would cut USA immigration and imitate the Canada Express Entry system for selecting economic immigrants.
Of the 300,000 immigrants Canada expects to welcome in 2017, 172,500 of them fall into the economic class. The remainder of the target falls under family class and refugee immigration.
The economic class number is divided again between Canada’s provinces, plus federal programs for business immigration, caregivers and skilled workers.
Canada Immigration 2017 Targets
Immigration Category | Category | 2017 target |
Economic | Federal Economic- High Skilled | 73,700 |
Federal Economic- Caregivers | 18,000 | |
Federal Economic- Business | 500 | |
Provincial Nominee Program | 51,000 | |
Quebec Skilled Worker | 29,300 | |
Economic Total | 172,500 | |
Family | Spouses, Partners & Children | 64,000 |
Parents & Grandparents | 20,000 | |
Family Total | 84,000 | |
Refugees & Protected Persons | Protected Persons in Canada & dependants in abroad | 15,000 |
Resettled Refugees | 25,000 | |
Government-Assisted Refugees | 7,500 | |
Blended Visa Office-Referred | 1,500 | |
Privately Sponsored Refugees | 16,000 | |
Refugees & Protected Persons Total | 40,000 | |
Humanitarian and Other | Humanitarian and Other | 3,500 |
Overall Total | 300,000 |
Source: Government of Canada
How Express Entry Works
Canada’s Express Entry System is used to select the skilled workers who best fit the economic needs of the country. The federal skilled worker allocation for 2017 is 73,700, which will almost entirely be selected through the Express Entry System.
Under Express Entry, candidates are given a Comprehensive Ranking System score based on a series of factors including age, education, language proficiency and Canadian work experience, considered central to their ability to succeed in Canada. The credentials of a spouse or common law partner can also contribute to the overall score in each category.
There are also a number of skills transferability points available for combinations of education and language or education and work experience.
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To see how points are awarded, have a look at the Express Entry points grid.
Outside the core factors, a nomination from one of Canada’s provinces is worth 600 points under Express Entry. A job offer from a Canadian company, meanwhile, scores 50 or 200 points depending on the field of expertise.
The Canadian government has often tinkered with the scoring system. It moved to downgrade the number of points for a job offer from the original 600. It also introduced points for a Canadian education and for having a sibling in Canada.
In 2017, thousands of candidates scoring in the lower 400s have been invited to apply for Canada immigration. That can come either through a provincial program or one of three federal programs: Federal Skilled Worker, Federal Skilled Trades or the Canadian Experience Class.
Immigration vs Canada’s Population
Canada’s immigration target for 2017 represents 0.9 per cent of the country’s 35 million population. Some 20.6 per cent of the population was foreign born, according to the 2011 census, with results from the 2016 census to be published before the end of 2017. This compares to immigrants representing 13.5 per cent of the U.S. population, according to 2015 figures from the Migration Policy Institute.
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