Changes announced in Canada immigration programs

As per the Citizenship and Immigration Canada(CIC), the intake of Canada immigration applications for a selected categories of immigration programs will undergo changes.

This will be done in order to cut back the piling backlog of Canada economic immigration applications.

Changes in Canada Federal Skilled Worker Program—Canada immigration department maintained that the changes aim not just to reduce the backlog of Canada visa applications but also seek to reduce waiting times.

In order to be eligible for Canada’s Federal Skilled Worker Program, aspiring immigrants should either possess minimum paid work experience of one year in any one of the total 29 occupations need to have an offer of valid job from any Canadian employer.

There will be no change in the list of 29 eligible occupations, revealed Canada immigration minister Jason Kenney, for the coming period of one year. The only change will be with regard to the number of Canada immigration applications to be accepted for processing.

500 Canada visa applications to be accepted under Federal Skilled Worker Program—Canada immigration department will accept a total of 500 applications for processing for each occupation. Hence, a total of 10,000 Canada immigration applications will be considered for the coming one yaear.

Meanwhile, those having a valid offer of job from any Canadian employer will not be affected by such limits.

Since, all open Canada occupations are likely to get filled soon, hence, applicants for Canada immigration are being encouraged to apply at the earliest.

Changes to Federal Immigrant Investor Program—The upper limit for applications to be received under Federal Immigrant Investor Program has been fixed to 700 for the coming one year. All applicants will have to furnish a copy of Canada passport, duly filled forms and processing fees to the Centralized Intake Office, Sydney, Nova Scotia.

Requirements for Federal Immigrant Investor Program are—

• A minimum of C$1,600,000 Canadian dollars;
• Some prior business experience;
• and willing to invest Canadian $800,000.