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The canadian "citizen and immigration" service is seriously understaffed (thanks, Mr. Harper!). Some consequences of this:

* It currently takes more than two years in average to process a citizenship request.

* The CIC stopped accepting any new application from canadian citizens or permanent residents to sponsor their parents or grandparents for permanent residency.

So, this all sounds good in paper, but Im skeptical about how well it will work in reality.

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Since this is permanent residency and not citizenship, shouldn't it be a fair amount less effort and paperwork on immigration's part?

Actually you typically apply for citizenship after you become a permanent resident, and it takes less effort (from the candidate, at least). But in any case, it is the same service that is in charge of both citizenship and permanent residency, and they are understaffed. Perhaps they will give more priority to Startup visas processing than to other types of visa.

Permanent residency is the major step towards canadian citizenship, and the biggest bottleneck. Citizenship is (from what I heard) relatively straightforward after waiting the necessary number of years.

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