The Immigration Branch's overseas operations are run by External Affairs and International Trade Canada who deliver the Immigration Program abroad through the network of 65 full immigration processing centres and 34 other centres that process only visitor visas. These immigration centres are located across the globe in regions such as: Africa, the middle East, Latin America, Asia, the Carribean and the United States, serving potential immigrants, visitors and refugees wishing to come to Canada.
The Foreign Operations Branch is responsible for overseeing and administering the Department's overseas posts. The Branch's officers, in turn, are responsible for recruiting, selecting and processing immigrants and non-immigrants abroad. They also provide counselling services to potential immigrants or visitors, and distribute information in the form of published material on Canada to interested candidates. In addition to these responsibilities, the foreign officers must also ensure that an effective reporting system is developed for the foreign service which will serve the needs of the Department, that the posts abroad will be able to perform the role of interpreting departmental policies and programmes, that reports are received from all areas of the world which will keep the Department informed about conditions and developments in matters related to employment and immigration in foreign countries, and to gather, store, and retrieve intelligence information of relevant to the Department about the source countries.
The records in this collection are comprised of central registry files from the 3000 (Manpower) and 5000 (Immigration) Series. The material in this accession consists of information relating to topics such as: Canadian and international manpower services, Canadian occupational requirements, administration of the Department's overseas posts and ports, diplomatic relations, medical examinations, adoption, background papers on foreign countries, refugees, selection and processing of immigrants and visitors and work permits. The documents in these files are in the form of correspondence between headquarters and oversees personnel, statistics, reports, telexes, newspaper clippings, publications and reports produced by EIC as well as international organizations and departments, operating plans, ministerial releases, cabinet documents and situation reports. Also see accession 1989-90/284, which contains records created by this same branch.
