Full 2014 Citizenship Statistics: Declining Applications

Finally, CIC has released the full operational stats for 2014. The most striking aspects are:

• the record number of new citizens, given the influx of additional funds to address the backlog, confirming the previous announcements by press release; and,
• the dramatic decline in citizenship applications from in 2012 (close to 200,000), to about 130,000 in 2013 and 2014, a drop of over 30 percent.

Unless there are methodological changes to explain this drop (CIC’s Quarterly Administrative Data has no notes to this effect), hard to explain. The January-September figure was 126,170, compared to the full-year figure of 129,993 meaning only about 4,000 new applications in the fourth quarter.

Or did CIC not enter new applications into the GCMS database as part of the transition to the provisions of the new Citizenship Act?

I have requested clarification from CIC of the reasons for this drop and will share once received.