Punjabi is fourth most spoken language in Canada

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Toronto, February 14: : Punjabi is the fourth most spoken language in Canada after English, French and Chinese, according to an official census.

While English and French are official languages, Chinese, Punjabi, Spanish, Italian and Arabic are the most five most widely spoken non-official languages in the country. Punjabi is also the 4th most spoken language in the Canadian Parliament.

According to the census by Statistics Canada in 2006, the most widely spoken non-official languages is Chinese (2.6 per cent of Canadians). It is followed by Punjabi (0.8 per cent), Spanish (0.7 per cent). Italian (0.6 per cent) and Arabic (0.5 per cent).

Aboriginal languages, many of which are unique to Canada are spoken by less than one per cent of the population and most of them are on the decline.

Urdu is the 11th most widely spoken among the non-official languages, while Tamil is at the 17th and Gujarati at 19th position.

Statistics is a federal responsibility in Canada and Statistics Canada produces statistics for all the provinces as well as the federal government. In addition to conducting about 350 active surveys on virtually all aspects of Canadian life, Statistics Canada undertakes a countrywide census every five years on the first and sixth year of each decade.