The rural/urban immigration difference

Conversations about immigration often pretend that managing the numbers and where they go is as simple as turning a dial up or down. Like most things, the truth is more nuanced.

The Immigrant Employment Councils of Canada network’s 18-month engagement with over 1,100 employers, community and settlement service stakeholders made this apparent in many ways but, perhaps an underappreciated facet is the contrast between urban and rural immigration, and what challenges both immigrants and employers face in each context.

Rural and urban labour markets differ in structure, services and constraints, and a one-size solution will underdeliver everywhere.

This is why we have government programs such as the Rural Community Immigration Pilot, currently active in 14 areas across the country, as well as the provincial nominee program and provincial rural immigration pilots such as Manitoba’s West-Central Immigration Initiative.

During our consultations, rural employers highlighted gaps: small HR teams, under-resourced settlement services, long travel distances and limited public transit were barriers to hiring skilled immigrants.

As in cities, many rural businesses are small, and don’t always have experience hiring skilled newcomers or HR teams to navigate immigration processes and work on employee onboarding and retention.

Unlike in cities, rural employers may have to travel much farther to access any help.

Both big cities and rural areas face challenges in attracting international workers. But for rural areas, the retention challenge is often stronger and more difficult to overcome.

Newcomers are free to pack up and move to where job density is higher.

To be competitive in attracting (and keeping) skilled labour, rural businesses need practical support — mobile newcomer settlement services, employer-led housing solutions where scarcity exists, and recruitment pitches that make rural living attractive.

Urban employers, by contrast, face regulatory complexity (albeit with more access to solution pathways than rural), high housing and living costs, and fierce competition for talent. According to their input, the top solution priorities are diversity programs, inclusive culture, and formal onboarding by employers. From government, employers seek mechanisms that align credentialing with occupational standards.

These are complementary policy problems, not competing ones.

Rural solutions should focus on access and retention — employer-sponsored housing from large employers, mobile services and keeping rural transport systems intact, whether private or public.

Urban solutions should aim to clear administrative bottlenecks, streamline credential recognition in dense labour markets, and push forward housing measures to boost supply and affordability.

Perhaps above all, a final report summarizing all consultation findings showed that employer engagement was the most consistently prioritized theme across rural and urban forums.

Employers appreciate having their concerns and improvement ideas heard. With their fingers on the pulse of labour markets nationwide, they are also a good source of intelligence for policymakers keen to understand economic trends before they show up in the data.

Like all Canadians, immigrants have a choice about where to live.

They decide based on lifestyle, personal factors, practical considerations, and economic opportunity. That so many choose to settle in our big cities isn’t surprising; most Canadians do, as well.

But it does suggest that we have work to do to make rural areas more attractive to skilled talent from abroad.

What to do, then? We have a few ideas.

Cities have it easier in terms of attracting skilled global talent, but they cannot rest on their laurels. Time and again we heard from employers about housing costs as the biggest barrier to landing and keeping workers. Solutions here are politically fraught, if conceptually simple.

Federal and provincial governments could co-fund regional settlement hubs that support mobile services in rural areas that help businesses to attract, hire, and retain skilled talent. Employers, when they have the resources, must embed recruitment and retention strategies into their workforce planning so that new arrivals become long-term local contributors. The settlement sector as a whole should ensure that employers are partners in the settlement journey, and not just employment outcomes.

Finally, programs such as the rural pilot program should be scaled up if proven effective, but with a realistic expectation about their long-term outcomes. Some pilot participants are likely to move to cities once they have satisfied their conditions for permanent residency, making this program one tool in a toolbox and not a silver bullet.

That’s why it’s so important to ensure we listen to rural businesses, understand their needs, and create the conditions for skilled workers to thrive no matter where they choose to live.

Patrick MacKenzie is CEO of the Immigrant Employment Council of B.C. Enver Naidoo leads the Rural Manitoba Immigrant Employment Council.