What effect does immigration have on the environment? Much has been written on this topic. The following is a very brief look at studies on this topic, three of which are Canadian and the third, American. All 4 of these sources question unending population growth and say that immigration, which is responsible for about two-thirds of Canada’s population growth, is having a significant negative effect on the environment.
I. The first is a 1976 report done by the Science Council of Canada. If Canada wanted to retain its standard of living, the Science Council said Canada must recognize that it did not have unlimited resources, so it had to conserve what it had, restrict immigration and stabilize its population. See the following link :
II. The second is a 1997 University of British Columbia study called “Prospects For Sustainability“. It looks at the unsustainable effects of explosive population growth in B. C.’s Lower Mainland (Metro Vancouver and the adjacent Fraser Valley).
III. The third is a list of publications taken from the Center For Immigration Studies web site. This section also refers to an American publication called “Forsaking Fundamentals” which examines the environmental movement’s abandonment of the effect of immigration on the environment.
IV. The fourth is the 2005 annual Report of Ontario’s Environment Commissioner, Gordon Miller. He too questioned unending (primarily immigration-driven) population growth in southern Ontario, particularly a projected population rise in all of Ontario to over 18 million by 2030. He stated that the area did not not have the water resources to support such a population increase. That report is called “Planning Our Landscape”. We provide the introductory letter to that report and a link to the report.
