Mexico misses legal immigration boom to Canada: EXEO

Mexico is squandering a boom in legal immigration to Canada, whose government plans to grant up to 1.88 million permanent residences between 2022 and 2025.

Marc-André Séguin, co-founding partner of EXEO, a consultancy specialized in immigration procedures, concludes that Mexicans are generally unaware of the real options available to them to work temporarily or reside permanently in Canada. Typically, Mexicans attempt or succeed in working in that nation illegally with tourist permits.

Others obtain political asylum, but often with counterproductive results. Canada’s refugee board says that of the 2,747 refugee claims they received from Mexicans from January to June this year, 637 were accepted and 850 were rejected. The rest of the applications were abandoned, withdrawn or are awaiting a decision.

The Canadian government provides immigrants with open job categories, such as a young man who studied Mechatronics in Canada for a master’s degree, can immediately apply for a two-year job there, as well as closed ones, such as working in a manufacturing company, in post-production movies or in a restaurant. In total there are more than 80 categories.

At the same time, the government is continuing a program to grant an increasing number of permanent residences each year as follows: by 2022, up to 430,000 residences; in 2023 up to 465,000; in 2024, up to 485,000, and in 2025 up to 500,000.

“There is a misinformed movement of people who are looking for work in Canada by Mexico and the paths must be clarified, because Canada does need workers and is very aggressively raising its permanent residence issuance targets for the coming years,” commented Seguin.

Canada now has 1 million vacancies and the foreseeable trend is that that demand will continue to rise in certain sectors, partly due to its aging population.

In particular, Mexico has a great advantage because its citizens do not require a visa to enter Canada.

“In practical terms, that means that if a Mexican citizen wants to enter Canada and get a work permit with the endorsement of a Canadian employer, they don’t have to go through consular processing, like in the United States, there is a waiver when they have all the documents and permit requirements,” Séguin said.

Therefore, a Mexican can take the plane and, arriving in Canada, can get his work permit at the airport in a few hours, which is very different from the United States, where consular processing can take months.

Séguin stressed that the correct way is to get a job offer from Mexico, through specialized companies or agencies, such as the National Employment Service. The worker may even be in Canada with his wife and his children under 22 years of age.

Canada’s natural population growth rate fell 0.3% from 2016 to 0.1% in 2021, the lowest level on record.

roberto.morales@eleconomista.mx