Characteristics of Immigrant Transnationalism in ... - Metropolis BC

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Table 10: Transnational activities by identification as Canadian
Family Keep Travel Job Property Business Send $
in home in to home requires in home in home to home
number* country touch country travel country country country
Always 462 85.4 93.6 71.3 6.8 18.3 1.8 11.2
Most of the time 399 91.2 93.4 70.6 7.3 17.0 1.5 13.4
Sometimes 309 93.2 97.9 70.9 3.8 20.0 2.9 18.3
Occasionally 110 93.6 97.1 60.0 20.0 32.7 3.7 21.3
Never 160 95.0 98.7 59.4 16.7 45.9 10.8 15.8
Probability 0.001 0.011 0.001 0.030 0.000 0.000 0.044
* Total number in the survey; the number answering each question is different and less than the total indicated here.
Indicates highest value
Indicates lowest value
Columns printed in a light tone indicate non-significant results in chi-squared tests.
Discussion
We would not expect transnational practices to be the same in any two places. Much of the American
research has been undertaken in southern California and the cities of the East Coast. Those migrants are
typically of modest means and travel between relatively close origins in Central America and the
Caribbean and their homes in the United States. In Vancouver, in contrast, recent immigration is
dominated by sources in East Asia, principally China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Korea, South-east Asia,
notably the Philippines and Vietnam, and South Asia, principally India. Older migration is from
Europe. Movement between Vancouver and these origins is long and can only be undertaken by air, an
expensive means of transport. Distance and cost are bound to affect the easy movement of transnational
migrants.
It is instructive to compare the incidence of transnational activities in Vancouver with a
longitudinal panel survey undertaken in Montreal (Renaud et al. 2002). In the fourth round of
interviews with some 300 immigrants ten years after arrival, 96 percent of respondents had family in
their home country, compared with 90 percent in Vancouver who specified they had friends or family in
their home countries. Of the Vancouver sample, 68 percent had travelled to their home country at least
once, close to the Montreal figure of 72 percent. There were also surprisingly similar likelihoods of
owning property in the country of origin (22 percent in Vancouver, 24 percent in Montreal), and of
owning a business there (3.2 percent in Vancouver, 2.3 percent in Montreal). In contrast remittances
were sent by far fewer Vancouver immigrants, only 14 percent, compared with figures ranging between
28 percent and 67 percent in the four rounds of the Montreal panel (Renaud et al. 2002).