Provincial Nominee program

PNP (Provincial Nomination Program) offers an alternate route to Permanent Residence of Canada to Foreign Nationals applying under Skilled worker or business Immigration program of Canada.
Canada has signed separate agreements with each of the ten provinces and three territories for nomination of skilled workers by those provinces and territories. By virtue of those agreements Canadian provinces and Territories can nominate permanent residents to live in those provinces and meet the labour shortage and demand of skilled workers in those areas.

The following provinces and territories are participating in this program:

  • Alberta
  • British Columbia
  • Manitoba
  • Nova Scotia
  • New Brunswick
  • New Found land & Labrador
  • Nunavut
  • Northern Territories
  • Ontario
  • Prince Edwards Island
  • Quebec (Separate agreement)
  • Saskatchewan
  • Yukon
Each province has its own demographic composition due to which most of their nomination programs are either occupation restricted or job offer based. For high tech and technical jobs, job offer route may work. Other applicants have to adopt the occupations in demand route.
PROCESS:
Provincial Nomination is a two step process:
  • Provincial Processing
  • Federal Processing

Applicants first submit an Expression of interest (EOI) to the said province where their profile qualifies. Upon receiving an invitation to apply, their full application along with supporting documents is submitted to the provincial immigration department. There is a provincial application fee as well that is paid at this stage.

Upon completion of the eligibility assessment, nomination certificate is issued to the applicant along with a work Permit support letter. Applicants then submit application for Permanent Resident Visa to the Federal government. Besides they may submit Work Permit application to come earlier and start working in the province as the federal processing of PR visa could be time consuming, particularly in case of Paper applications.

The Federal government assesses applicant and his family for admissibility concerns as enumerated below.