Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC), on January 2nd, 2013, decided to accept the application for the permanent residency in Canada under the Federal Skilled Trades Program. Notable thing is that the program is based on quota and restricted to 3000 applications every year with sub quotas in many of the 43 targeted occupations.
Prerequisites
The eligibility of the applicants is assessed on the basis of the pass or fail, with applicants required to fulfill the below four requirements:
- Holds an employment offer from one or two Canadian employers for the period of at least one year in an eligible skilled trade (NOC Skill level B), or have a formal attestation of qualification for that trade from a Canadian provincial or territorial regulatory body; Provide proof of enough language skillability in certainly considered one among Canada’s professional languages;
- Display language proficiency evidence in one of Canada’s two official languages;
- Exhibits 24 months of work experience in the past 5 years in the skilled trade, after trade qualification, where applicable;
- Qualified to meet the requirements of trade in Canada or the job offer (s) as defined by the NOC;
The Federal Skilled Trades Class exempts applicants willing to establish themselves in the Province of Quebec which has its own authority to select applicants.
Certification or Offer of Employment
Trade certification in Canada lies under the provincial jurisdiction, where each province specifies a set of regulated professions and established regulatory bodies where necessary. It is difficult to get a provincial certification from outside Canada. It is, therefore, this program will be beneficial to tradespeople who get an approved offer of employment from a recognized employer or who are already employed as a temporary foreign worker in Canada. Since every trade is not regulated by all the provinces, so an offer of employment becomes mandatory where a trade is not regulated.
A tradesperson will also be eligible to apply if a Canadian employer provides an approved offer of employment for 1 or more year to the tradesperson in their trade. The employment offer will be assessed to make sure that it is an eligible trade and that the hiring will have a neutral effect on the Canadian Labour Market.
Language Requirement:
It is mandatory that the applicants must provide a proof of their basic proficiency in English or French language for all the four language abilities which includes speaking, reading, listening and writing. Only test results from a CIC designated language testing agency will be reckoned to establish proficiency.
Two most generally used language tests are:
- IELTS for English
- TEF for French.
Applicants must obtain the below scores in each respective language ability:
| Speaking | Listening | Reading | Writing | |
| IELTS | 5.0 | 5.0 | 3.5 | 4.0 |
| TEF | 225 | 180 | 121 | 181 |
Eligible Trades and Caps on application
CIC accepts a maximum of 3000 applications in the Federal Skilled Trades Class in each calendar year. Eligible trades are separated into two categories:
- One with individual sub-caps of 100 applications and
- Others with no sub-cap.
Applications in the following trades will be accepted up to a maximum of 100 or until the total Class cap of 3000 applications is reached:
- 7202 Contractors and supervisors, electrical trades and telecommunications occupations;
- 7204 Contractors and supervisors, carpentry trades;
- 7205 Contractors and supervisors, other construction trades, installers, repairers and services;
- 7271 Carpenters;
- 7301 Contractors and supervisors, mechanic trades;
- 7302 Contractors and supervisors, heavy equipment operator crews;
- 8211 Supervisors, logging and forestry;
- 8221 Supervisors, mining and quarrying;
- 8222 Contractors and supervisors, oil and gas drilling services;
- 8241 Logging machinery operators;
- 8252 Agricultural service contractors, farm supervisors and specialized livestock workers;
- 9211 Supervisors, mineral and metal processing;
- 9212 Supervisors, petroleum, gas and chemical processing and utilities;
- 9214 Supervisors, plastic and rubber products manufacturing;
- 9231 Central control and process operators, mineral and metal processing;
- 9241 Power engineers and power systems operators;
- 9243 Water and waste treatment plant operators.
Applications in the following trades will be accepted until the total Class cap of 3000 is reached, with no sub-cap applying:
- 7231 Machinists and machining and tooling inspectors;
- 7233 Sheet metal workers;
- 7235 Structural metal and plate work fabricators and fitters;
- 7236 Ironworkers;
- 7237 Welders and related machine operators;
- 7241 Electricians (except industrial and power system);
- 7242 Industrial electricians;
- 7243 Power system electricians;
- 7244 Electrical power line and cable workers;
- 7245 Telecommunications line and cable workers;
- 7246 Telecommunications installation and repair workers;
- 7251 Plumbers;
- 7252 Steamfitters, pipefitters and sprinkler system installers;
- 7253 Gas fitters;
- 7311 Construction millwrights and industrial mechanics;
- 7312 Heavy-duty equipment mechanics;
- 7313 Refrigeration and air conditioning mechanics;
- 7314 Railway carmen/women;
- 7315 Aircraft mechanics and aircraft inspectors;
- 7318 Elevator constructors and mechanics;
- 7371 Crane operators;
- 7372 Drillers and blasters – surface, mining, quarrying and construction;
- 7373 Water well drillers;
- 8231 Underground production and development miners;
- 8232 Oil and gas well drillers, servicers, testers and related workers;
- 9232 Petroleum, gas and chemical process operators;