MONCTON, NB – The cultural makeup of Greater Moncton is changing but not as quickly as in other major urban centres according to the latest census data.

Justin Ryan with MAGMA, the Multicultural Association of the Greater Moncton area, says immigration is now the largest component of Canada’s population growth.

“That’s being requested by, for example, the provincial government through the provincial nominee program where they are looking for people to come over with money to invest in business ownership and people to come in with highly skilled sets of labour,” Ryan notes.

Ryan says the traditional idea of bilingualism is changing too with many of the roughly 400 newcomers they help every year speaking a language other than English or French.

The census data shows Korean and Arabic are the largest non-official languages spoken in Greater Moncton but together still make up less than one percent of the overall population.