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Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Dates

2022 - Present

Type of practice

Project/Programme

Geographic scope

Local:

Atlantic provinces (Nova-Scotia, New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Prince-Edward-Island)

Summary

Canada’s Atlantic Immigration Program (AIP) is a pathway to permanent residence to Canada for skilled foreign workers, and international graduates from a Canadian institution, who want to work and live in one of Canada’s four Atlantic provinces—New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island or Newfoundland and Labrador. The program helps Canadian employers hire qualified candidates for jobs they haven’t been able to fill locally.

The program was initially launched as a 5-year pilot in 2017 as part of the Government of Canada’s Atlantic Growth Strategy, which aims to accelerate the growth of Atlantic Canada’s economy. Specifically, the Pilot was designed to test approaches to attract and retain skilled immigrants in Atlantic Canada. It responded to the region’s acute demographic and economic challenges, including slow growth, chronic labour market shortages, an aging workforce, and difficulty attracting and retaining immigrants.

On January 29, 2021, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) published its Evaluation of the Atlantic Immigration Pilot online (https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/corporate/rep…). This evaluation incorporated the experiences and feedback of applicants, employers, service provider organizations, and provincial stakeholders. The report found that the Pilot was largely successful in supporting labour market needs in Atlantic Canada as a result of its unique employer-driven model, enhanced settlement support, and federal-provincial partnership approach. Since the launch of the Pilot, over 12,000 principal applicants and their families have received their Canadian permanent residency and landed in Atlantic Canada through the Pilot (data as of December 31st, 2022). As a result, the Pilot transitioned to a new permanent program – the AIP – on January 1, 2022.

The permanent Atlantic Immigration Program (AIP) builds on the strengths of the Pilot and retains the core objective of attracting skilled immigrants to Atlantic Canada to address demographic and economic needs, as well as to continue to increase retention in the region. Similar to the Pilot, the permanent program will continue to help employers find skilled workers to fill jobs, so they can grow their businesses and the economy.

Organizations

Main Implementing Organization(s)

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC)

Detailed Information

Immigration Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC)

Partner/Donor Organizations

Atlantic Provinces

Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency

Federally-funded and provincially-funded service provider organizations

Employers

Benefit and Impact

The Pilot has successfully addressed regional labour market needs and increased newcomer retention in the Atlantic region. For example, the majority of newcomers that came through the Pilot continue to live in Atlantic Canada after their first year, and early evidence indicates that the Pilot has a higher retention rate than other economic programs in the region. As well, many employers designated under the Pilot were first-time users of immigration, indicating that the Pilot increased awareness of the benefits of immigration and provided an opportunity for employers to consider immigration as a tool to address their chronic labour shortages. The evaluation of the Pilot found that 58% of surveyed employers reported that this was their first time using an immigration program to hire a foreign worker.

Key Lessons

The Atlantic Immigration Pilot Program underwent an independent evaluation in 2020 which raised several recommendations, including:

Strengthening Program Performance Data: While the Pilot’s multi-party model created opportunities for collecting robust performance information, obtaining key Pilot results information has been challenging. Further, limited data from key stakeholders has made it difficult to report and assess ongoing performance and outcomes. Clear data collection responsibilities, an achievable data collection strategy, and a common set of key success measures are needed to support effective performance measurement and results reporting, especially as the Pilot has transitioned into a permanent program.

Increasing awareness of settlement services: Newcomers to Canada have free access to settlement services to help them integrate into their Canadian communities. These services are funded by the Canadian federal government, and services include language training, community connections, and needs assessment and orientation to help immigrants settle in Canada. For the Pilot, applicants have an initial assessment to identify their settlement needs, which results in a settlement plan. While settlement plans were found to be useful for Pilot principal applicants and their families, a proportion of surveyed Pilot principal applicants were not aware that they could access settlement services. The impact of lack of awareness indicates that some Pilot newcomers may not be benefiting from the full suite of supports available to help them integrate successfully in their communities.

Supporting AIP designated employers: To facilitate communication with IRCC, employers participating in the Pilot have access to enhanced employer support services through a Dedicated Service Channel (DSC). Through the DSC, employers receive timely support from IRCC program officers on applications submitted under the Pilot. While the DSC was identified as a useful support for Pilot employers, more than half of the surveyed employers participating in the Pilot were unaware of its existence. Acknowledging that the DSC is not only designed to provide assistance to the AIP but to support other employer-driven programs within IRCC, more could be done to leverage support for employers, particularly through the DSC. Moving forward, there is an opportunity to support more employers requiring help to navigate the pathways to immigration. In addition, IRCC should review profile and needs of employers who utilize the DSC, as well as identifying barriers to accessing the service.

Communicating AIP updates and changes: With a variety of stakeholders, all with differing levels of experience with immigration, there is a need for a clear and timely communication changes to the AIP from Pilot to permanent program. Information, including announcements, program changes, integrity concerns, and pilot updates should be adequately communicated and shared with stakeholders.

Recommendations(if the practice is to be replicated)

Canada recommends involving employers in playing an active role in welcoming and settling newcomers. The employer-driven model has proven to be successful under the Atlantic Immigration Pilot. Establishing a greater role for the employer to support the newcomer and their family members in settling and integrating in the community has played a large part in the success of the AIP, including higher retention rates to that region of Canada. Employers are responsible for connecting with a settlement service provider organization and learn about the settlement needs of their newcomer employees and prepare their workplace to welcome newcomers. Responsibilities could include supporting newcomers with language training, housing, transportation, and other settlement supports to help with integration.

Innovation

The Atlantic Immigration Pilot Program, and now the permanent Program, were developed around three innovative aspects that aimed to attract and retain skilled immigrants in Atlantic Canada in support of regional economic growth: an employer-driven model, settlement requirements for applicants, and multi-party governance with a variety of stakeholders. Designed with a collaborative approach, the Pilot is delivered by IRCC, the 4 Atlantic provinces in Canada, the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (the Canadian regional development organization), federally-funded and provincially-funded service provider organizations , and employers.

The Canadian federal government and the Atlantic provincial governments worked collaboratively to ensure that the Pilot evolved to meet the immediate and long-term labour and demographic challenges of the region. Strategic program changes were made to the pilot in early 2019 in response to early results and stakeholder feedback (including from employers and candidates).

The permanent program continues to complement Canada’s existing other economic immigration program with a provincial focus – the Provincial Nominee Program – by maintaining key program elements that distinguish the Atlantic Immigration Program as Canada's flagship regional economic immigration program (e.g. aligning immigration with region-wide economic development strategies), and offering provinces additional pathways through which candidates can migrate to the region and support provincial economic needs.

The success of the Atlantic Immigration Pilot has encouraged the development of other regional economic immigration programs such as the Rural and Northern Immigration Pilot Program, and the Agri-Food Pilot Program.

Applicants of the Atlantic Immigration Program are required to have a job offer from a provincially designated employer. Due to several job losses during the COVID-19 pandemic, IRCC was flexible in allowing candidates time to secure a new job offer if the job offer in the current application was lost. This allowed candidates to maintain their pathway to permanent residency and allowed employers to fill their labour market needs as vacancies became available again.

Additional Resources

Atlantic Immigration Program

Date submitted:

02 April 2022

Disclaimer: The content of this practice reflects the views of the implementers and does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations, the United Nations Network on Migration, and its members.