Alberta's culture GDP shrinks as sports sector expands, StatsCan says

Culture-related jobs accounted for $5.3 billion of Alberta's total economy in 2016, down slightly from the previous year, according to a report released Tuesday by Statistics Canada on the economic clout of sport and culture in Canada.

As the overall Alberta gross domestic product (GDP) dipped by 5.2 per cent and economy-wide jobs fell 1.3 per cent in 2016, the culture GDP fell by 1.1 per cent — representing 57,816 jobs, the federal agency said.

Culture GDP still accounted for 1.7 per cent of the provincial economy in 2016.

The drop in culture GDP was led by a 5.6 per cent decline in visual and applied arts and a 3.7 per cent dip in written and published works.

Sports as a component of GDP, on the other hand, grew in Alberta by 2.3 per cent to $773.6 million in 2016.

Sports jobs increased

There were 13,440 sport jobs in Alberta in 2016, up by 3.6 per cent since 2015, the report says.

Nationally, culture GDP totalled $53.8 billion in 2016 (an increase of 1.5 per cent from 2015) and accounted for 2.8 per cent of Canada's economy.

Sport GDP was worth $6.5 billion in 2016 and represented 0.3 per cent of the national economy, Statistics Canada says.

The largest contributors to culture GDP and jobs are audio-visual and interactive media and visual and applied arts domains, including design, broadcasting, film and video.

In sport GDP, the largest component is organized sport activities, including hosting sporting events.

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