Ottawa makes it easier for Lululemon to hire foreign workers

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Lululemon Athletica Inc., the high-end apparel maker known for its yoga pants, won an exemption from immigration rules that limit access to foreign workers, clearing the way for international hiring as the company expands its Vancouver headquarters.

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Immigration Minister Sean Fraser agreed that Lululemon would not have to apply Labor market impact assessment (LMIA) to hire for some highly skilled positions, including senior managers, industrial and production engineers, construction managers and computer systems managers.

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The LMIA is essentially a screen that the federal government uses to assess whether companies really need access to international workers to fill positions, or whether they are simply looking for cheaper labor. When an LMIA is approved, it means that Ottawa has determined that there are not enough Canadian workers or permanent residents available for the job.

Waiving the need to apply for an LMIA will allow Lululemon to bring in workers more quickly, which in turn will help “accelerate the economic benefits” of the company’s expansion, Immigration said in a press release shared by the government before an official. the announcement is scheduled for 6:00 p.m. Toronto time on May 25.

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The department added that the move will help “secure” Lululemon’s global headquarters in Vancouver as the company pledges to expand in the city over the next five years, creating about 2,600 jobs — most of which will be high-skilled positions that will be filled by foreign workers.

It was unclear whether Lululemon said it would scale back its presence in Canada without granting an exemption to foreign workers. In 2016, the company threatened to move its headquarters outside of Canada if the federal government did not make it easier for it to hire skilled workers from abroad.

While Canada’s relatively liberal approach to immigration is widely seen as an economic advantage, various business leaders have warned this year that other countries are catching up, making the competition for talent even tougher.

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“As they maintain their global headquarters in Vancouver and continue to expand, our government will continue to promote immigration policies that ensure employers like Lululemon attract the talent they need for economic growth here in Canada,” said Fraser in the statement.

In 2022, the number of job vacancies in Canada averaged 942,000, two and a half times the average of 377,000 recorded in 2016, according to Statistics Canada.

The significant increase in job vacancies recorded during this period indicated that the economy was struggling with a labor shortage. However, Statistics Canada also said in a report released May 24 that “employers’ difficulty filling vacancies requiring high levels of education cannot generally be attributed to a national shortage” of highly educated job seekers or a local shortage of such jobs. seekers.

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Vacancies may arise due to a mismatch between the skills required and the skills possessed by highly educated job seekers, the report said. However, starting in 2021, a labor crunch was observed for vacancies requiring a high school diploma or less, the agency added.

In 2022, Lululemon reported net income of $8.1 billion, compared to $6.2 billion in 2021. Its gross profit increased to $4.4 billion from $3.6 billion in 2021.

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