Foe to the Canadian national
census, over one million people
designate one of the Chinese languages
as their original language. This new
revelation makes Chinese, which is
spoken in the Mandarin or Cantonese
tongues, the third most spoken language

   

in the country, behind only English and
French, respectively.

It is not just Chinese that is
experiencing a surge in speakers through
immigration. In BC, 26.8 percent of
all residents reported that they possess
a native tongue that is not English or
French. For example, in the city of

Richmond, 60.3 percent of people, or
105,250 of the 174,461 people living
in Richmond, have a native language
other than English or French. This is the
highest of any city in Canada.

For Canadian provinces and
territories, the territory of Nunavut
has an astonishing 71.2 percent of its
inhabitants who speak a non-English or
French native language. Percentage wise,
British Columbia and Newfoundland are
next with 26.8 percent of their population
speaking a foreign native tongue, and
Ontario follows suit with 26.1 percent of
their people.

Hong Kong immigrant Kevin
Wong believes that the immigration
insurgence has to do with the image
of Canada as a very ethnically diverse
country.

“Everyone is part of a mixture.
There’s a mixture of cultures here — from
their position in society and their way of
living. Also they can live in their original
style too,” says Wong.

Canada has a total immigrant
population of about 6 million landed
immigrants. Of that number, a majority
came from parts of Asia and the Middle

January 7, 2007

Canada’s Immigrant Numbers on the Rise

By Garth McLennan, News Editor

East. For the first time in Canadian
history, the number of immigrants
born in Asia-Middle East totaled more
than immigrants of European decent.
There are approximately 2.278 million
European born Canadian citizens.

Also revealed in the study was
that 27.5 percent of British Columbians
are born outside of Canada. Nationally,
20 percent of all Canadian citizens
are not Canadian born. Among major
Canadian, American and Australian
cities, Vancouver is now second, behind
Toronto and in front of Miami, Florida in
the proportion of citizens not born in the
country they are living in.

The study tallied upanincredible
200 languages being considered a native
language throughout the study for 2006.

Due to a declining birth-rate
on British Columbian soil, coupled with
increasing unemployment numbers, a
remarkable 85 percent of citizen growth
in this province will be provided by
immigration from foreign countries
until the next national census study is
conducted.

 

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