Provincial and Territorial Cultural Indicators, 2022
Released: 2024-06-03
There was continued recovery in Canada's culture and sport sectors in 2022 following the initial COVID-19 pandemic restrictions put in place in the early part of 2020. Nominal gross domestic product (GDP) of culture and sport increased in all provinces and territories in 2022.
Canada's GDP attributable to culture and sport reached $65.2 billion in 2022, rising 8.6% from the previous year, but at a slower pace than the growth in total economy GDP (+11.8%) over this period. Nonetheless, the increase pushed nominal culture and sport economic activity past the pre-pandemic levels of 2019. The contribution of culture and sport to economy-wide GDP edged down from 2.6% in 2021 to 2.5% in 2022 given the faster growth in the GDP for the overall economy, which was buoyed by inflationary pressures.
In 2022, jobs held in the culture and sport sectors increased 8.3% (approximately 57,000 jobs), while economy-wide jobs increased at a lower rate of 4.6%. The share of jobs attributable to culture and sport compared to the total economy rose to 3.7% in 2022, up from 3.6% in 2021.
Culture sector records widespread gains
Canada's culture nominal GDP increased 8.2% to $58.5 billion in 2022, with gains recorded in all domains. The largest contributors to this growth were the visual and applied arts (+$1.4 billion; +12.0%) and the culture governance, funding, and professional support (+$0.8 billion; +8.6%) domains. Design and advertising were the primary subdomains behind growth in the visual and applied arts domain.
As a proportion of total economy GDP, culture accounted for 2.2% in 2022, down from 2.3% in 2021.
Culture jobs increased 7.8% to 648,825 in 2022 with culture jobs accounting for 3.3% of all jobs in Canada. Growth was led by job increases in both the visual and applied arts and the live performance domains.
Chart 1
Growth in nominal gross domestic product by culture domain, 2022
Strong growth in Canada's sport sector
Sport GDP was up 11.4% in 2022, totalling $6.7 billion, with all subdomains increasing. Organized sport saw the largest increase, with GDP growing by 24.6%. Despite this increase, GDP in organized sport is still 24.3% below the pre-pandemic levels of 2019.
Similar to sport GDP, jobs in the sport sector increased in all subdomains in 2022. Overall, the number of sport jobs rose 11.3%, to 97,375. Jobs in the organized sport subdomain increased in 2022 by 20.1%, yet were 4.0% below pre-pandemic levels.
Chart 2
Growth in nominal gross domestic product by sport domain, 2022
Trends in culture and sport across Canada
All provinces and territories saw growth in culture GDP in 2022, although to varying degrees. Canada's three largest provinces—Ontario (+9.2%; +$2.2 billion), Quebec (+8.3%; +$959.3 million) and British Columbia (+8.2%; +$703.6 million)—witnessed some of the highest growth in culture GDP. Reflecting the diverse economies across the country, the contribution of culture to economy-wide GDP varied across Canada, ranging from 0.9% in Saskatchewan to 2.7% in Ontario.
In 2022, all provinces and territories posted gains in the number of culture jobs except for the Northwest Territories (-6.7%). Culture jobs as a share of the total economy ranged from 1.7% in Nunavut to 4.1% in British Columbia.
All provinces and territories experienced increases in sport GDP in 2022, with Ontario (+$349.5 million; +10.3%), British Columbia (+$135.9 million; +12.5%) and Alberta (+$67.5 million; +9.6%) increasing by the largest amounts. The share of sport GDP to total economy-wide GDP demonstrated little variation across Canada.
Like sport GDP, increases in jobs attributable to sport were seen in all provinces and territories apart from the Northwest Territories, which recorded a decline (-3.2%) in 2022.
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Note to readers
The Provincial and Territorial Culture Indicators (PTCI) were developed as an extension of the more comprehensive Provincial and Territorial Culture Satellite Account. The PTCI cover culture (including arts and heritage) and sport across Canada in terms of output, nominal gross domestic product (GDP), and jobs for the period from 2010 to 2022.
The PTCI are a joint initiative of Statistics Canada, other federal agencies, all provincial and territorial governments, as well as non-governmental organizations.
All the GDP figures in this release are expressed in nominal, basic prices. Total economy GDP is calculated using income-based GDP at market prices minus taxes less subsidies on products and imports.
This release focuses on the product perspective of the PTCI—the production of culture and sport goods and services and their contribution to output, GDP and jobs in both culture and non-culture industries and sport and non-sport industries.
Culture GDP is the economic value added associated with culture activities. This is the value added related to the production of culture goods and services across the economy, regardless of the producing industry. Culture jobs are the number of jobs that are related to the production of culture goods and services.
Sport GDP is the economic value added associated with sport activities. This is the value added related to the production of sport goods and services across the economy regardless of the producing industry. Sport jobs are the number of jobs that are related to the production of sport goods and services.
Film and video
The film and video subdomain underwent major enhancements starting with reference year 2015. The sources and methods for estimating this subdomain, notably the Survey of Service Industries: Film, Television and Video Production, have been revised to include improved estimation methods.
The new methodology increases the use of administrative data in combination with survey data to build the estimates. These methodological improvements were applied to all variables (GDP, output and jobs).
Written and published works
Print publishing has continued to decline as industries shift toward producing online content. This decline can be seen within the written and published works domain with the exception of the 2017 reference year. In 2017, the sources and methods for estimating this domain were enhanced to more accurately represent the presence of online publishers. This was a result of the new 2017 North American Industry Classification System.
Audio-visual and interactive media and visual and applied arts
Refinements to the video game publishing and design and development industries, and to the computer systems design and related services industry were introduced in 2016 to improve estimates around video game development and website design. These impact both the design and interactive media subdomains of the visual and applied arts domain and the audio-visual and interactive media domain, respectively.
The sources and methods used to estimate both these subdomains have been enhanced and were applied to all variables (GDP, output and jobs). The new methodology will use survey data for each province and territory specifically for the video game industries and website design activity in that geography.
Users can expect significant revisions to both design and interactive media starting in reference year 2016. There will be a noticeable break in the data series in most geographies for the interactive media and design subdomains from 2015 to 2016. This break does not represent a real change in economic conditions. Estimates prior to 2016 are on the old basis and should be used with caution.
Products
The Economic accounts statistics portal, accessible from the Subjects module of our website, features an up-to-date portrait of national and provincial economies and their structure.
The Latest Developments in the Canadian Economic Accounts (13-605-X) is available.
The User Guide: Canadian System of Macroeconomic Accounts (13-606-G) is available.
The Methodological Guide: Canadian System of Macroeconomic Accounts (13-607-X) is available.
Contact information
For more information, or to enquire about the concepts, methods or data quality of this release, contact us (toll-free 1-800-263-1136; 514-283-8300; infostats@statcan.gc.ca) or Media Relations (statcan.mediahotline-ligneinfomedias.statcan@statcan.gc.ca).
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