Population issues symposium topic

Islanders are encouraged to attend a public symposium Thursday that will discuss Amish settlers to P.E.I. and the Temporary Foreign Worker Program. The event, titled “Island Mobility, Migration and Population Issues,” will be held at UPEI’s MacKinnon Auditorium, Room 242, McDougall Hall, beginning at 7 p.m. All are welcome and admission is free.

Population change has always been at the core of the development of small islands – and it is no different on P.E.I. Every day the public media deliver news about some aspect of population: youth outmigration, rural depopulation, an aging workforce, temporary foreign workers, refugees, wealthy immigrant investors. The symposium will provide an opportunity for the public to hear about and contribute to the debate on several of the salient population issues that are crucial to the future of P.E.I.

There will be three featured speakers. Dr. Jim Randall will provide an overview of the major population changes taking place on P.E.I. from a “small islands” perspective. Katie Mazer is a PhD Candidate researching the movement of workers between the Maritimes and natural resource industries ‘out west’. Katie’s presentation will focus on Islanders going west and migrant workers coming into the province through the Temporary Foreign Worker Program. The third speaker is Tony Wallbank who has spearheaded the upcoming migration of two communities of Amish farmers from southern Ontario to eastern Prince Edward Island. The first Amish settlers will arrive next spring. He will tell us about the Amish, explain why they find rural P.E.I. attractive, and review some of the challenges in this process of community resettlement.

There will be ample time for discussion and questions from the floor. Laurie Brinklow, Institute of Island Studies