The Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA), formerly called Labour Market Opinion (LMO), is a document that must be secured by a Canadian employer that wishes to get the service of a temporary foreign worker and employ them within the territory of Canada. The LMIA is used to confirm the need for foreign workers to fill some job vacancies which the employer has, and that no of the Canadian candidates are qualified or available to occupy the said employment positions due to insufficiency of the workforce in the market.
It is a market verification process launched by the Canadian government that allows the Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC) to determine whether or not a specific job offer to a foreign worker entails an adverse impact on the Canadian labour market. The Canadian employer is mandated to submit vital documents and supply information that would help the assessing officer to produce a report confirming a dearth of workers for the position, and that the job offer made to a foreign national worker is indeed reasonable and necessary.