The following article about the Canadian government’s Economic Mobility Pathways Pilot (EMPP) appeared in the Globe and Mail on June 9, 2025 and is republished here with permission.
By Marie Woolf (Globe and Mail)
In the Ontario village of Schomberg, the local stone masonry shop is known for holding the Guinness world record for the tallest freestanding inukshuk sculpture.
Since last year, the company, which crafts marble columns and limestone windowsills out of stone from its quarries, has cultivated another cause for renown: rescuing Syrian refugees.
Peter Melo, general manager of Allstone Quarry Products, has helped two refugees establish new lives in Canada with their families, and he is in the process of hiring one more.
But whether his latest Syrian employee ever arrives may depend on whether the federal government’s Economic Mobility Pathways Pilot (EMPP), a program that matches qualified displaced people with job vacancies in Canada, expires this week as scheduled, or is extended by Ottawa as promised by the previous Liberal government.
The clock is ticking for the EMPP, which was founded in 2018 as a route to permanent residence and is due to expire on Thursday.
Much has changed since the program was set up. There have been three immigration ministers and two prime ministers in the past six months alone.
Norah Vollmer, manager of faculty affairs at Carleton University, said Abeer’s skills are an exact fit for a research project being run by a Carleton professor, and he is keen for her to join the faculty swiftly. But it has taken seven months to fill in the requisite paperwork, and Abeer still has to undergo biometric checks.
— Globe and Mail
Prime Minister Mark Carney has said that his overall goal is returning immigration to sustainable levels while “attracting the best talent from around the world to help build Canada’s economy.”
The government would not say whether the EMPP will be a casualty of targets to cut immigration or will be renewed at the 11th hour. “We cannot speculate on future policy decisions,” said Isabelle Dubois, a spokesperson for Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada.
Applications that have already been received will still be processed regardless of whether the pilot program expires, she added.
Those who have already arrived in Canada through the program have their futures in the country secured.
But for those who have not yet received job offers, the future is more precarious, as they wait to learn whether the pilot will continue.
An internal memorandum sent last year by IRCC officials to Marc Miller, then-minister of immigration, notes the minister pledged to make the EMPP a permanent economic immigration program by 2025.
The document, obtained through access to information laws, sets out the regulatory process to make the program permanent.
It suggests extending the expiration date of the federal policy from June 12 to Dec. 31, “to allow for a seamless transition between the pilot to the permanent program.”
Mr. Melo of Allstone Quarry Products says the two Syrians he has already hired through the EMPP have transformed his company with their energy and hard work.
One of them, Abdulaziz, had fled the Syrian civil war to Iraq. The other, Omar, had sought refuge in Lebanon. The Globe and Mail is not publishing the full names of some refugees owing to fears for the safety of family members in their home countries.
Mr. Melo said helping Abdulaziz and Omar get settled required work.
“It took a lot of cultivating, a lot of motivating, a lot of patience, a lot of reassurance, a lot of helping them, day to day, week to week,” he said. “Sure enough, they’ve both become very valuable employees, and they’re just great people.”
The uncertainty now surrounding the future of the EMPP is causing consternation not just for refugees who have applied for jobs in Canada under the program, but also for their prospective employers.
Among them is Carleton University in Ottawa, which has hired a refugee from the civil war in Sudan as a visiting professor, to help with research into artificial intelligence.
Abeer, who fled to Somalia, holds a PhD in wireless communications and network engineering. She has researched the impact of AI and machine-learning-based algorithms on wireless communication systems.
Norah Vollmer, manager of faculty affairs at Carleton University, said Abeer’s skills are an exact fit for a research project being run by a Carleton professor, and he is keen for her to join the faculty swiftly. But it has taken seven months to fill in the requisite paperwork, and Abeer still has to undergo biometric checks.
“We need this scholar here now,” Ms. Vollmer said. “She has no status in the country she is in.”
‘You can’t turn economic visas on and off like a tap without harming Canadian workplaces. Employers put time and resources into international hiring, and that investment is lost if a visa pathway suddenly ends.’
— Dana Wagner, co-founder of TalentLift
Dana Wagner, co-founder of TalentLift, a non-profit international recruitment company that matches displaced people with employers, said that with no direction from the federal government both employees and refugees are in limbo. Letting the program just expire would be “counterproductive and cruel,” she said.
“You can’t turn economic visas on and off like a tap without harming Canadian workplaces. Employers put time and resources into international hiring, and that investment is lost if a visa pathway suddenly ends,” she said.
“People in really tough refugee situations around the world are also investing in their job search with Canadian teams. There’s a number of people waiting on the results of an interview, or working hard to get one, who’d be facing yet another major lost opportunity if Canada ends this program.”
One refugee waiting anxiously to see if the program will lapse is Espérat King Ntakarutimana, a nurse from Burundi who fled to Rwanda in 2018 and is hoping to come to Canada as a health care worker.
Ms. Wagner says his candidacy is currently being reviewed by a Canadian health care employer and he is hoping for an interview, but if the program is cancelled his hopes could be dashed.
At the stone suppliers in Schomberg, Mr. Melo is also watching closely to see if the program will continue, and whether his two Syrian workers will be joined by another of their countrymen.
He fondly recalls picking the refugees up at the airport, where Omar’s sister, already living in Ontario, showered him with thanks for bringing her brother to safety.
“I was buzzing for months about it. They were so grateful,” he said. “It was a really, really special feeling.”
