Canada to increase the number of temporary foreign workers in rural regions
The Liberal government has chosen to prioritize foreign workers over Canadians by increasing the number of temporary foreign workers rural businesses can hire.
Author: Clayton DeMaine
Despite youth unemployment hitting 14 per cent, the Liberal government has chosen to prioritize foreign workers over Canadians by increasing the number of temporary foreign workers rural businesses can hire.
The federal government announced Friday a decision to raise the temporary foreign worker cap to 15 per cent in rural areas, citing requests from provinces and territories. The new cap will be implemented at the start of next month and remain in place for at least a year.
The announcement states that under the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP), businesses must “demonstrate that genuine efforts to recruit Canadian workers were unsuccessful” and continue domestic recruitment while their application to hire low-wage migrants is reviewed.
Notably, Canada’s International Mobility Program does not require business owners to prove they have attempted to hire Canadians. Data from 2019 to 2023 suggests approvals for the International Mobility Program surged at a faster rate than the TFWP, ballooning by 126 per cent while TFWP rose by just 88 per cent.
Also on Friday, the Canadian Federation of Independent Businesses released a statement supporting the new cap limits for the TFWP in rural areas. The statement claimed that over 52 per cent of small business owners who use the temporary foreign worker program say that it “protects Canadian jobs.”
The same day, Statistics Canada released its labour force survey, which states that Canada’s youth unemployment rate—a measure of people aged 15 to 24 actively looking for work but unable to find it—rose by 1.3 per cent in February to 14.1 per cent.
The report notes that the “increase brings the youth unemployment rate closer to the recent high of 14.6% reached in September 2025, which was the highest since 2010, excluding 2020 and 2021.”