Canada makes rural immigration pilot permanent, plans future expansion

Canada has made the Rural Community Immigration Pilot permanent to help employers in participating rural communities recruit and retain workers, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada announced Nov. 9. The government intends to continue the program in its existing 14 communities and expand it to additional communities in the future.

The employer- and community-led program addresses labour shortages that cannot be filled locally, according to the department. The 2027–2029 Immigration Levels Plan includes a target of 5,500 admission spaces for the permanent Rural Community Immigration Program. Eligibility criteria for communities seeking to join a future expansion will be announced later.

The program relies on partnerships between employers and community organizations to connect newcomers and their families with settlement support, the department said. Those partnerships are intended to help workers remain in the communities where they settle.

From January 2025 to August 2026, participating communities vetted and designated more than 1,950 employers facing persistent labour shortages, according to the department. Those employers issued more than 4,700 job offers and community recommendations.

The department said early results from 2025 and 2026 show newcomers filling jobs in health care, education, and sales and services. It has operated the Rural Community Immigration Pilot since 2025.

The current program follows the Rural and Northern Immigration Pilot, which ran from 2019 to 2024. More than 2,800 employers participated in that earlier pilot, and more than 12,500 candidates and their family members were admitted to rural and smaller communities across Canada, according to the department.