Immigrants in Rural Canada - ARCHIVED

In 1996, 17% of Canada's total population were immigrants, and 88% of them were living in urban regions. The three provinces with the largest urban centres attracted most immigrants: 55% went to Ontario, 18% to British Columbia and 13% to Quebec, a pattern that has remained constant for immigrants who have arrived since 1961. The remaining 12% (or 580,000 people) were living in predominantly rural regions. They can be characterized by the period in which they arrived in Canada.

Recent and new immigrants were better educated than pre-1981 immigrants, particularly in terms of university education. But pre-1981 immigrants had the highest employment rate and were more likely to have professional service occupations than the Canadian-born. Visible minority immigrants fared worse, in socio-economic terms, than non-visible minority immigrants; these differences were more pronounced in predominantly rural regions. The profiles of immigrants in predominantly rural regions were similar to those in predominantly urban regions. However, the few immigrants who resided in rural northern regions had a very different and more favourable profile.