No kidding, China has more people than Canada? I never knew that. However, the number of people does not change the point.

People often resist the idea of having multiple languages for knee-jerk reasons. It's too costly, they're a minority and should speak our language, blah blah blah. Yet the reality is that China prospers even though it has hundreds of spoken languages. 

It's even more interesting when you consider that China has an authoritarian government. If they wanted they could just tell everyone to speak Mandarin or else. But they don't. The government of China officially recognizes 56 different ethnic groups in the country. They don't see multiculturalism and multilingualism as a threat. Yet you'll still find Canadians who- 50 years later- condemn the fact that we have even two official languages.