Canada's population soars with immigrant and refugee arrivals

According to the data agency there were 437,815 more people living in Canada than there were on the same day a year earlier, bringing the official population to 36,286,425.

Analysts say in absolute terms, that's the biggest annual surge since 1988.Similarly in terms of percentage, the population grew by 1.2 percent.

Bank of Montreal Economist Doug Porter says, the "increase is one of the largest increases since the baby boom in the 1950s, although this recent increase is driven more by immigration."

Undeniably, the statistics show that some 320,932 immigrants arrived in Canada between the two Canada Days. However, more than 30,000 Syrian refugees are included in that figure, as they are classified as permanent residents by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada.

Statistics Canada in a release mentioned, "The country had not received such a large number of immigrants in a single annual period since the early 1910s, during the settlement of Western Canada.”

As per data available, it is seen that two provinces still make up the majority of the country's population- Ontario at 13.9 million and Quebec at 8.3 million.

However, defining by age, the single largest demographic group was people between ages 50 and 54, with 2,711,318 across the country.

(Reporting by Debarati Mukherjee)