Government Targets 437,000 Permits to Address Population Growth
Ottawa: In a significant policy shift, the Canadian government has revealed plans to reduce the number of new international student study permits for 2025. This move aims to better manage the rising influx of temporary residents as the nation’s population surpasses 41 million.
Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) announced on Wednesday that the target for new study permits will decrease by 10 percent, dropping from 485,000 in 2024 to 437,000 for 2025. The agency confirmed that the number of study permits issued in 2026 will remain consistent with the 2025 target.
This latest announcement follows a prior reduction earlier this year, when the government indicated that approximately 360,000 undergraduate study permits would be approved for 2024. This represented a notable 35 percent decrease from the nearly 560,000 permits granted in 2023.
The recent changes come in response to a surge in temporary residents in Canada, which saw a rise in population numbers during the first quarter of 2024. Earlier this year, IRCC also projected a decline in the proportion of temporary residents from 6.5 percent of Canada’s total population to 5 percent by 2026.
