The Immigration Levels Plan acts as a guide for the number of immigrants Canada aims to welcome over the next three years. Canada has just released its Immigration Levels Plan 2023-2025. Canada will aim to welcome 465,000 new immigrants in 2023. The target will rise to 485,000 new immigrants in 2024. It will further rise to 500,000 new immigrants 2025. Canada broke its all-time immigration record by welcoming over 405,000 immigrants in 2021 and is looking to welcome nearly 432,000 immigrants this year. The Immigration Levels Plan acts as a guide for the number of immigrants Canada aims to welcome each year. Canada’s immigration goals include growing the economy, reuniting families, and offering asylum to refugees fleeing hardship abroad.

1. Canada to welcome 500,000
new immigrants in 2025

2. The Immigration
Levels Plan acts as a
guide for the number
of immigrants
Canada aims to
welcome over the
next three years.

3.  Canada has just released its Immigration Levels Plan
2023-2025.
 Canada will aim to welcome 465,000 new
immigrants in 2023.
 The target will rise to 485,000 new immigrants in
2024.
 It will further rise to 500,000 new immigrants 2025.
 Canada broke its all-time immigration record by
welcoming over 405,000 immigrants in 2021 and is
looking to welcome nearly 432,000 immigrants this
year.

4. Express Entry and PNP targets will rise
 The majority of new permanent residents immigrate
through economic class programs such as those
within the Express Entry system or
through Provincial Nomination Programs (PNPs).
 The targets for Express Entry landings (principal
applicants, spouses, and dependents) will rise as
follows:
 82,880 in 2023
 109,020 in 2024
 114,000 in 2025

5.  IRCC also has a mandate to reunite families. After
economic class programs, family class sponsorship is
the second largest permanent residence class set out
by the Immigration Levels Plan. Under family class
immigration programs, applicants are sponsored for
permanent residence by a spouse, partner, children,
or other family member.
 Canada will continue to look to welcome some
80,000 new immigrants per year under the Spouses,
Partners and Children program.
Higher PGP admissions

6. Refugee and humanitarian class targets to
decline
 Refugees and humanitarian class immigrants also
have an allocation under the Immigration Levels
Plan. Canada has a long-standing reputation of
extending asylum to displaced persons fleeing unsafe
situations in their home countries.
 Canada currently has high humanitarian class
targets due to its ongoing efforts to complete several
campaigns such as welcoming some 40,000 refugees
from Afghanistan.

7.  The overall refugee class target will be just over
76,000 new landings in each of 2023 and 2024,
before dipping to 72,750 in 2025.
 The same goes for the humanitarian class target
which is declining from nearly 16,000 in 2023 to
8,000 in 2025.

8. Canada’s immigration strategy
 Canada’s current immigration strategy began to take
its current form in the 1980s. At that time, the
government did not look as far into the future and
often based immigration targets on the economy of
the day.
 In 1984, Canada welcomed fewer than 90,000
immigrants. Leading into the 1990s, the Canadian
government under the Conservatives recognized the
impending shortage of labour and increased
immigration targets to 250,000 new permanent
residents in the space of eight years.

9.  The following Liberal government built on these
targets but due to an economic recession, also began
to place more emphasis on inviting newcomers more
economic class immigrants and reducing Canada’s
family and humanitarian class shares.
 Canada welcomed some 260,000 immigrants
annually until current Liberal government took
power in 2015. The targets were increased to
300,000, followed by 340,000 right before the onset
of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.

10.  The closure of borders and other travel restrictions
in 2020 made it difficult for IRCC to process
applications. Still, Canada exceeded its 2021
immigration target and broke the record for the most
permanent residents invited in a year, at 405,000.
These targets were reached through large allocations
of spots through the Canadian Experience Class and
Provincial Nomination Programs (PNPs).
 Canada is currently in a unique period where there is
a labour shortage alongside nearly one million job
vacancies. Both are driving factors in the country’s
growing immigration targets.

11.  Labour shortages are further impacted by Canada’s
low birth rate of 1.4 children per women, one of the
lowest globally. Due to the slow natural increase in
the population (the number of births still exceeds the
number of deaths each year), immigration will soon
be the only way that Canada’s population and labour
force will be able to grow. Newcomers are also
needed to maintain a strong tax base, which is a key
factor in Canada’s efforts to provide essential
services such as education and healthcare.

12.  Canada has one of the world’s oldest populations.
Approximately nine million people, or nearly a
quarter of Canada’s population, will reach retirement
age by 2030. This will create an urgent shortage of
workers throughout all sectors of the economy.
 The government must announce the Immigration
Levels Plan each year by November 1 as per
the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA),
which is Canada’s main immigration law. However,
the 2022-2024 immigration levels plan was the
second announced in 2022.

13. THANK YOU