Gross Domestic Product by Industry: Sources and Methods - ARCHIVED

Like most statistical agencies, Statistics Canada publishes three Gross Domestic Product (GDP) series. These are the output-based GDP, the income-based GDP and the expenditure-based GDP. This document is aimed at describing the concepts, definitions, classifications and statistical methods underlying the output-based GDP series, also known as GDP by industry or simply monthly GDP.

The report is organized into seven chapters. Chapter 1 defines what GDP by industry is, describes its various uses and how it connects with the other components of the Canadian System of National Accounts. Chapter 2 deals with the calculation of the GDP by industry estimates. Chapter 3 examines industry and commodity classification schemes. Chapter 4 discusses the subject of deflation. The choice of deflators, the role of the base year and the method of rebasing are all addressed in this chapter. Chapter 5 looks at such technical issues as benchmarking, trading day and seasonal adjustment. Chapter 6 is devoted to the presentation of the GDP by industry, detailing the format, release dates and modes of dissemination, as well as the need and the frequency of revising the estimates. Finally, Chapter 7 reviews the historical development of monthly GDP from 1926 to the present.