(IRCC) recommends that IRCC process a total of 285,000 decisions and 300,000 new citizens by March 31, 2023. The citizenship target means that 300,000 approved applicants must take the oath of citizenship, either in person or virtually.
This is a significant increase over the 2021-2022 fiscal year and even exceeds the pre-pandemic targets of 2019-2020, when 253,000 citizenship applications were processed.
In 2021-2022, IRCC succeeded in welcoming 217,000 new citizens. So far in the 2022-2023 fiscal year, Canada has welcomed 116,000 new citizens and is well on track to hit target. By comparison, over the same period in 2021, Canada had only sworn in 35,000 people.
IRCC says it has taken steps towards clearing the backlog, and processing 80% of all new applications within service standards. To do this, over 1,000 new staff have been hired and there are plans to expand access to the citizenship application status tracker to representatives. Additionally, minors under the age of 18 will be eligible to apply for citizenship online by the end of the year.
