City of Brandon Pleased to Aid Business Success with Launch of Rural & Northern Immigration Pilot

December 13, 2019

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Brandon, MB – The City of Brandon’s much-anticipated Rural & Northern Immigration Pilot has officially been launched on www.economicdevelopmentbrandon.com/BrandonRNIP with the aim of connecting skilled professionals from across the globe or those already in Canada on temporary status with hard-to-fill vacancies in Brandon’s labour market.

Brandon is one of 11 Canadian municipalities selected by the federal government to participate in the three-year pilot, which aims to match area employers with a proven need for skilled professionals with such individuals from other nations or those who are already in Canada on temporary status such as students or temporary workers.  This unique and exciting pilot places two critical immigration decision factors under the authority of the community, that being the determination of genuine labour need and determination of the intent for an applicant to remain in Brandon & area.

Brandon’s pilot has been developed to appeal to two distinct, yet interconnected user groups: 1) Area employers who wish to advertise chronic job vacancies across all sectors (with the exception of those in entry level wholesale or retail trade, accommodation and food services, or sales and service occupations) and 2) Foreign Nationals or temporary residents, who can create a user profile and apply for such jobs directly on the Economic Development website. By coordinating these two aspects on the same website, the Economic Development Brandon office will act as a matchmaker of sorts, screening applicants for mandatory requirements before forwarding eligible candidate applications along to participating employers. Once a Foreign National or temporary resident receives a qualifying full-time, permanent job offer they go through additional screening to receive a “Community Recommendation” from the Economic Development Office, after which they can then begin their journey through the federal immigration process to become a permanent resident in Canada.

City of Brandon Director of Economic Development Sandy Trudel says the pilot’s greatest strength lies in the fact that it has been tailored to the community’s true labour needs and provides those from other countries and their families a quicker, more focused path for obtaining permanent residency in Canada.

“While we always desire to fill vacancies in the local labour market from within Canada, there are often gaps due to factors beyond our control such as an aging population or the unwillingness of skilled professionals to move to a smaller centre,” Trudel notes. “By offering a path to permanent residency through the supported network we’ve created, our pilot program positions Brandon to be able to better connect with skilled professionals who display the motivation and willingness to settle in Brandon and make our community their long-term home.”

Trudel says if each milestone of the pilot’s process runs smoothly, a successful applicant could be in their new job in Brandon inside of seven months - but that timeline is highly dependent on the timeliness of that applicant’s required actions. Trudel adds that while Brandon has the opportunity to approve a maximum of 100 community recommendations in the pilot’s first year, the pilot’s Recommendation Committee is placing its focus squarely on ensuring successful applicants have a positive experience and ultimately stay in Brandon.

“For us, our measure of success won’t simply be ‘pushing through’ 100 community recommendations in the first year of this three-year pilot, but rather, it will be finding the right skilled professionals who are the right fit for our small Prairie Canadian city. However, we firmly believe that by creating the program’s framework as a personalized, welcoming one that includes settlement supports, we will realize success by keeping these permanent residents and their families in our community for the long-term,” Trudel concludes.

Enquiries regarding Brandon’s Rural and Northern Immigration Pilot can be directed to immigration@brandon.ca or through the Economic Development Brandon website at www.economicdevelopmentbrandon.com/BrandonRNIP.