Immigration, Talent & Women’s Entrepreneurship
Building Canada’s Workforce, Businesses and Communities
As Canada develops its 2027–2029 Immigration Levels Plan, an important opportunity is emerging: better connecting immigration policy with small-business growth, workforce stability, entrepreneurship, and regional economic development.
To help inform a federal consultation with the Office of the Honourable Lena Metlege Diab, Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, the Women’s Enterprise Organizations of Canada (WEOC) conducted a targeted national consultation with organizations supporting women and newcomer entrepreneurs across Canada.
The resulting report, Immigration, Talent & Women’s Entrepreneurship: Building Canada’s Workforce, Businesses and Communities, captures the key findings and recommendations shared by organizations working directly with women entrepreneurs, newcomer entrepreneurs, employers, and small businesses in diverse regions and communities.
Key Insights
The report highlights six key findings:
- Women-owned businesses are facing significant workforce and talent pressures that limit their ability to serve customers, take on new opportunities, and grow.
- Retaining employees is as important as recruiting them. Clearer pathways to permanent residence are essential for workers who are already contributing to Canadian businesses and communities.
- Immigration programs can be complex, slow, and unpredictable, creating additional costs and business-continuity risks for smaller employers.
- Newcomers contribute not only as workers, but also as entrepreneurs, employers, business successors, exporters, innovators, and community leaders.
- Rural, northern, and regional communities can benefit greatly from immigration, but attraction must be matched by housing, transportation, settlement capacity, professional networks, and a genuine sense of belonging.
- Immigration pathways need to reflect the realities and limited administrative capacity of small and medium-sized businesses, not only large employers.
Why This Matters
Women entrepreneurs need access to skilled and flexible talent, as well as greater certainty that they can retain employees in whom they have invested. Newcomer women need pathways that recognize their professional experience, skills, and entrepreneurial potential. Small businesses need immigration programs they can understand and use without disproportionate legal, financial, and administrative burden.
Canada also has an opportunity to better recognize the broader economic contribution of newcomers. When newcomers are able to remain, build businesses, create jobs, acquire existing companies, enter new markets, and strengthen communities, immigration becomes a driver of long-term economic capacity.
About the Consultation
The consultation included contributions from eight organizations representing British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Ontario, Quebec, Newfoundland and Labrador, and Yukon:
S.U.C.C.E.S.S.; Newfoundland and Labrador Organization of Women Entrepreneurs (NLOWE); Evol Financement; Women Entrepreneurs of Saskatchewan (WESK); Yukonstruct; Immigrant Entrepreneur Canada; Volition; and WeBC.
Together, these organizations contributed perspectives from urban, rural, northern, Francophone, newcomer, and growth-oriented contexts.
The report is intended to support ongoing discussions among governments, ecosystem organizations, employers, settlement providers, and economic-development partners working to strengthen workforce participation, entrepreneurship, business growth, and community vitality across Canada.