Special Report
- Canada had the fastest growth among the G8 nations from 2001 to 2006. The population of Canada rose 5.2%. The United States ranked second, with a 5.0% growth.
- On July 1, 2007, Canada's population had reached 33.0 million, growing to 2.0 million more people than in 2001.
- Two-thirds of Canada's population growth is due to international migration: an average of 240,000 newcomers have arrived each year since 2001.
- Canada extends across a vast territory of nearly 10 million square kilometres and has 3.5 people per square kilometer. However, in the country’s large census metropolitan areas, population density reaches, on average, 238 inhabitants per square kilometre. Most of these census metropolitan areas are located in the southern part of the country. Vast northern areas are sparsely populated: the Northwest Territories, Yukon and Nunavut makes up 39% of Canada’s total area but had only 0.3% of its population in 2007.
- According to the 2006 Census, 68% of Canadians live in one of the country’s 33 census metropolitan areas. Moreover, 45% of Canada’s population lives in the six largest census metropolitan areas: Toronto, Montréal, Vancouver, Ottawa–Gatineau, Calgary and Edmonton. From 2001 to 2006, two-thirds of the population growth was in one of these six census metropolitan areas.
Top 5 facts sources: Statistics Canada (2010) Canada at a Glance