WHILE MOST OF CANADA STRUGGLES on the employment front, Alberta has become a magnet for job-seekers from other provinces and around the globe. And many of them are going shopping.

There’s a new retail centre, modelled on a traditional Asian-style shopping mall, that is planned for just north of Calgary, featuring more than 500 retail outlets. It’s just across the highway from CrossIron Mills, a shopping centre with 109,000 square metres of retail space, which opened in 2009. And the two of them are just down the road from Target’s new, 1.3-million-square-foot distribution centre, which will service the U.S. giant’s stores as they spread across Western Canada. And don’t worry about oversupply. All those shops will draw customers from the vast tracts of suburban starter homes that are going up in every direction around Calgary.

As others are beginning to notice, there’s money to be made in Alberta. The province’s population shot past the four-million mark for the first time as of July 1, having risen by almost 43,000 people over the previous three months (by 136,000 over the year). About 14,000 of the 34,000 who moved to Alberta in the fiscal quarter (as opposed to the new births) moved from other parts of Canada. Perhaps even more surprising, 10,500 of the newcomers were international migrants.

Now, four million is just a number; the province was bound to surpass it sooner or later. What’s more impressive is the speed at which Alberta’s population is growing – a very healthy clip of 3.5% per year, which the provincial government’s chief economist called “astronomical.” This rate is more than triple the national rate of 1.16% (and Canada itself is one of the fastest-growing countries in the industrialized world) and hasn’t been seen in Alberta since 1982.

In fact, Calgary and Edmonton are the two fastest-growing cities in the country, with small towns such as Olds and Airdrie seeing similar growth rates. Fort McMurray is in a class by itself, having grown by 15% in the past year alone.

Alberta needs every last one of these new residents – and more. The unemployment rate in Alberta is 4.3% (compared with 6.9% nationally), well below the widely acknowledged full-employment figure of 5%. With oil at US$102 a barrel and tens of billions of dollars in investment projected for the oilsands over the next few years, there’s no sign of this momentum abating. And consider this is happening while oil pipelines such as Northern Gateway and Keystone XL remain in limbo, and while natural gas prices remain pretty much in the toilet.

These growth numbers bring a dark side, too. Communities are struggling to integrate so many newcomers in such a short period of time, with a growing need for expensive basics such as schools and hospitals. It is also tough to find qualified help, whether it’s to weld pipes in the oilsands or hawk T-shirts at a mall.

There’s little question that the New Horizon Mall (as the Asian-style centre has been christened) will be full of shoppers when it opens. But will those 500 shops be able to find the staff they need?

If we keep seeing an influx like this, they just might.

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