Canada's immigration backlog shrinks to 2.2 million: IRCC

TORONTO: Canada's immigration backlog came down to just over 2.2 million from last month's 2.4 million, according to new data revealed by the Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC).

With this, the citizenship inventory stands at 3,14,630 applicants as of November 30, compared to 3,31,401 on October 31, CIC News reported.

The permanent residence inventory stands at 5,12,342 people as of December 2, compared to 5,06,421 as of November 3.

The biggest reduction was seen in the temporary residence inventory, which stood at 14,16,125 people on December 2, compared to 15,37,566 persons as of November 3.

As of December 2, there are 43,326 applications for Express Entry programs waiting in the queue -- an increase of over 3,500 since November 3 data, which stood at 39,589.

The inventory for all family class immigration programs has dropped slightly to 1,27,091 compared to November 3 when it was 1,28,112.

The Spouses and Partners sponsorship program is among the largest inventories among all lines of business, at 62,106, a minimal increase compared with November 3.

The Parents and Grandparents Program (PGP) has an inventory of 53,770 persons compared to 55,653 persons waiting for decisions in November.

September 30 data showed that there were 1.5 million applications in the backlog, meaning that IRCC cleared over 3,50,000 applications from the backlog.

This comes while the number of applications in inventory has risen for permanent residency, CIC News reported.

IRCC says that between January and October 2022, they produced 4.3 million final decisions for permanent residents, temporary residents and citizenship compared to 2.3 million final decisions in the same period last year.

The Canadian citizenship body says it wants to have a less than 50 per cent backlog across all lines of business by the end of March 2023.

To achieve this, IRCC began transition towards 100 per cent digital applications for most permanent resident programs on September 23.

It also hopes to make all citizenship applications digital by the end of this year, including those for minors under 18.