Government Agendas: Toronto Region

Academic Leaders Dept: The delegation spent two days seeing how senior business, government, non-profit and academic leaders work together to help newcomers prosper and fully contribute in the Toronto region. The delegates said that people in Johannesburg and the other consultation cities would cry to see how well people collaborate here. The number and diversity of the immigrants who settle here is also a differentiator. Over 40 per cent of Canada s new permanent residents about 120,000 people each year come to Ontario. Almost 80 per cent of them choose the Toronto region, where close to half of the population is foreign born. Other cities like Miami may have high numbers of foreign-born residents, but theirs are drawn primarily from one or two sources, whereas Toronto s come from the world over. Sometimes you need fresh eyes to remind you how good you have it. Last week,CivicActionhosted an international delegation that is examining immigration and its connection with business and municipal government agendas in five global cities. They came to see how Toronto has managed to attract and, for the most part, successfully integrate large numbers of immigrants, when so many other city regions have failed.Extensive cross-sector collaboration is only one of the things that set Toronto ahead of other city regions when it comes to immigration. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.