Canada has one of the world's highest standard of living and offers many opportunities to new immigrants. Since the beginning of the century, Canada's population has increased from 5 million to 27 million. Of this number, over 9.5 million were immigrants.

In the past 20 years, the yearly number of immigrants admitted by Canada ranged between 85,000 to 250,000. In 1985, Canada admitted 85,000 new immigrants while in 1999, 2000 and 2001, 189 922, 227 313 and 250 346 immigrants landed in Canada.