Canada will welcome 310,000 immigrants next year as part of a plan to bring nearly one million new people into the country by the end of 2020, Canada’s immigration minister announced on Wednesday.Last year’s historic high of 300,000 immigrants represents the “new normal” for the world’s second largest country, Minister Ahmed Hussen said last week in an interview with CBC.Straying away from its traditional one-year plans, the government unveiled a three-year immigration strategy in response to calls from provinces and stakeholders for longer-term projections.The plan, tabled after months of consultations around the country, aims to bring in 330,000 permanent residents in 2019, and 340,000 in 2020.“Everyone has been of the opinion we need more workers, we need more skilled workers, we need more people to power our economy, address our real skills shortages, address our real labour market shortages and also address the regional nature of some of these requirements,” Hussen said Wednesday. “So we’ve listened.”The increase will bring immigration levels to 0.9 of the population by 2020 — still short of the 1 percent recommended by the government’s economic advisory council in 2016 in order to address Canada’s aging workforce and declining birthrate which have been blamed for gaps in the labour market.The announcement follows 2016 census figures released last week showing that Canada has reached its highest immigration levels in almost a century. Nearly 22 percent of Canadians identify as current or former immigrants or permanent residents, up from less than 20 percent in 2006. Canada hit its peak of immigration in 1921 when 22.3 percent of the population were immigrants.According to Statistics Canada immigrants could make up to 30 percent of Canada’s population by 2036.
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