Immigration Wave Effects on Canada’s Trade

This paper utilizes an enhanced gravity model to estimate the effect of lagged immigration waves on Canadian imports and exports, by province. Empirically, this model was tested using Canadian data on import and export flows to the top 40 countries of origin for immigrants to Canada based upon the composition of the most recent wave of immigrants. The results are consistent with previous studies, where immigrants increased both import and export trade flows. By adding the provincial immigrant wave variable, it was also found that immigrants most strongly affect imports after 5-10 years, whereas for exports, the immigrant effect is strongest after 10-15 years. * Corresponding author. The authors would like to thank Rose Olfert (University of Saskatchewan) and Mark Partridge (University of Saskatchewan) for their useful comments.