CCA BULL ETIN / BULLETIN DE LA CCA
CULTURAL SECTOR GROWTH AHEAD OF ECONOMY AS A WHOLE
Ottawa , December 3, 2004 - Statistics Canada yesterday released new figures on the economic contribution of culture - in Canada , from a provincial perspective, and in Ontario . These were based on data from the annual Labour Force Surveys and cover the period 1996-2001 (ie: prior to the Tomorrow Starts Today funding).
CCA members will note that some of the statistics do not accord with those recently released by the Cultural Human Resources Council ( Canada's Cultural Sector Labour Force by Hill Strategies Research Inc. and Cultural Sector Fast Stats by T J Cheney Research Inc), due largely to differing definitions of what counts as culture and what does not. StatsCan uses industry classifications from the recently released Canadian Framework for Cultural Statistics (available on the StatsCan website at www.statcan.ca ), while CHRC's reports were based on data from the 2001 Census.
According to Kelly Hill, of Hill Research Strategies Inc, “multiple job-holding is common among artists, making any single classification system tricky” . The definition of culture used by StatsCan is: “Creative artistic activity and the goods and services produced by it, and the presentation of human heritage”.
Some highlights from the reports:
• Employment in the sector rose at an annual average rate of 3.4% compared to 2.3% in the economy as a whole.
• 611,000 individuals worked in the sector; 4.1% of Canada 's workforce.
• In 2001, total economic output from Canada 's cultural industry exceeded $38 billion, up 32% from 1996 ($29.2 billion). This represented 3.8% of GDP * (unchanged from 1996).
• The majority of culture workers (79%) were employed full time, compared to the national average of 81%. (NB: StatsCan figures include those working in heritage, libraries and archives where the workers are overwhelmingly employees.)
• Self-employment in the sector stood at just over 25% compared to the national average of 16%, and was highest in Ontario .
• Unemployment in the sector was 5.3%, well below the national average of 8.1%.
*The Canadian gross domestic product or GDP is the value of all goods and services produced in Canada in a calendar year. The gross domestic product includes only final goods and services, not goods and services used to make another product. Changes in the gross domestic product are an indication of economic output. (Source: canadaonline.about.com .)
The report for Canada breaks down the sector by percentage share of culture GDP and percentage share of culture employment. The three leading industries in both categories were written media, broadcasting, and film. (It should be noted that newspapers as well as books and periodicals are included in the StatsCan figures for written media, but newspapers were not included as a cultural classification in the CHRC studies.)
On a provincial basis, the statistics indicate that Ontario was the leading province for economic output and employment, accounting for 47% of the culture GDP nationally, and 43% of total Canadian cultural employment. Quebec accounted for 23% of national culture GDP , and British Columbia for 12%. Cultural employment increased in all provinces except New Brunswick and Nova Scotia .
The reports are available at:
http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/041202/d041202a.htm ( Canada ) http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/041202/d041202b.htm (provincial perspective)
http://www.statcan.ca:8096/bsolc/english/bsolc?catno=81-595-MIE2004024 ( Ontario )
For more information:
Kevin Desjardins
Communications and Public Relations Manager
(613) 238 3561 ext.11
Fax (613) 238 4849
60/04
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