The Economic Dimensions of Immigration to Peripheral Regions
This paper is an effort towards building a broader and deeper stock of knowledge relating to the many economic issues that arise with immigration to peripheral regions. Of special interest is to outline the economic dimensions of immigration because the primary focus is on the role of immigration in promoting economic growth and development in the periphery. The primary objectives of this paper include, the collection and tabulation of data on immigration, with a focus on economic immigration.
Methodology
Following previous literature, the term “immigrant” is used in this study to refer to all foreign-born individuals who are permanent residents of Canada. To meet the objectives of the this, approaches used for data collection and their analyses are reliable and easy to replicate.
 The primary data sources for this study are
·       Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC)
·       Statistics Canada
Some data used in this paper were obtained from the web sites of the above government sources. However, much of the required data is not available in the public domain and had to be acquired through different channels. Some data were made available under the specific data-sharing agreements Statistics Canada and CIC. Some Statistics Canada data were accessed through the Internet Data Library System (IDLS). The analysis that will be conducted is based primarily on descriptive tools. A distinction was made between immigrants destined to periphery and those who actually stayed in the region. Among those who stayed, separate data will be analyzed for more recent immigrants, i.e., those who arrived within five years before a population census, when possible. Some parts of the analysis also use data on the non-immigrant population to facilitate comparisons with immigrants.
     The period of analysis of this study is 1981-2006. The CIC data are based on the landing documents of immigrants and are for immigrant inflows. These are available for the entire period of analysis, and some are available until 2006. The Statistics Canada data are drawn from the six population censuses conducted during the period, the latest of which was conducted in 2006.
          The paper includes a descriptive analysis of the data to highlight the socioeconomic, demographic and geographic dimensions of immigration to the more peripheral regions of Canada and identifies gaps in research that can provide necessary information to implement immigrant attraction, integration and retention strategies in peripheral regions. The paper’s findings show that skilled immigrants and immigrant professionals  are well placed in the labour market and their labour market outcomes compare favorably with those of their non-immigrant counterparts. However the tepid or negative growth of highly skilled immigrants in many professions over the period might reflect a failure to retain these professionals. The loss of productive potential resulting from their departure is not known but needs to be explored. The role of entry barriers into certain regulated professions, such as health care and law, in preventing immigrants to practice in those professions should also be investigated.