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June 02, 2025CULTURE AND SPORT INDICATORS, 2023 Statistics Canada has updated indicators of Canada's culture and sport activities for 2023.
Nova Scotia's GDP from cultural production increased by 9.2% from 2022 to 2023. which was the fastest rise for cultural industries among provinces. Nova Scotia's GDP from sport increased by 8.2%.
Nationally, GDP from culture increased by 5.2% while GDP from sport was up 9.0%. All provinces reported rising GDP for both culture and sport production. Nova Scotia reported the fastest gain in culture GDP (Saskatchewan the slowest) while British Columbia reported the fastest gain in sport GDP (Newfoundland and Labrador the slowest).
Nova Scotia's production of culture products generated $1,181.0 million in nominal GDP in 2023. This was just under 2.0% of Nova Scotia's nominal GDP. Across Canada, GDP from culture was 2.2% of national GDP in 2023, with the highest shares in Québec, Ontario and British Columbia. Culture accounted for the lowest share of GDP for Saskatchewan.
GDP from sport in Nova Scotia was $189.1 million; 0.32% of provincial GDP. National sport production accounted for 0.26% of Canada's GDP (highest shares in British Columbia and Manitoba, lowest shares in Québec).
Production of culture and sport products is labour intensive. Nova Scotia's employment in culture products increased by 4.8% in 2023 (+2.4% nationally). Sport employment was up 6.3% in Nova Scotia (+5.3% nationally).
All provinces reported rising employment levels for both culture and sport. Prince Edward Island reported the fastest growth rates in both culture and sport employment levels. Culture employment growth was slowest in Ontario while employment in sport grew slowest in Alberta.
In Nova Scotia, there were 13,973 jobs in cultural production, amounting to 2.7% of provincial employment. Sport production added a further 2,681 jobs; 0.52% of Nova Scotia's employment. Nationally, culture accounted for 3.2% of employment (highest share: British Columbia, lowest share: New Brunswick). Sport accounted for 0.48% of national employment in 2023 (highest shares: British Columbia, lowest share: New Brunswick).
Culture and sport GDP each grew for the third consecutive year in Nova Scotia (in nominal terms) in 2023.
Nova Scotia's culture employment grew to levels above its previous high from 2013 though sport employment in 2023 was slightly below the peak from 2013.
Production of culture and sport products is divided into several domains and sub-domains. In this categorization, all Federal, Provincial and municipal government-owned institutions (except schools, colleges and universities) are classified under "governance, funding and professional support" even when their activity falls within the scope of another sub-domain. "Multi-domain" categories include industries that may be associated with more than one domain (examples: convention/trade show organizers, lessors of non-financial intangible assets).
Governance, funding and professional support (ie: government institutions) account for the largest shares of GDP and employment in culture and sport production.
Audio-visual and interactive media account for the second largest portion of Nova Scotia's culture and sport GDP; the majority of this GDP is generated from broadcasting.
Sport production accounts for the third largest part of culture and sport GDP in Nova Scotia. Education and training accounting for the majority of sport GDP, with an even larger contribution to GDP than education and training in culture.
Visual and applied arts were the fourth largest contributor to culture and sport GDP with the bulk of activity concentrated in design, architecture and advertising sub-domains.
Written and published works were the fifth largest contributor to Nova Scotia's culture and sport GDP, followed by live performance and (private) heritage and library institutions. Sound recording and music publishing was the smallest major domain of culture and sport GDP.
Each domain's contributions to Nova Scotia's culture and sport employment differed somewhat from the contributions to GDP. Governance, funding and professional support in culture remained the largest contributor. Sport was the second largest contributor to employment. Although audio-visual and interactive media was the third largest contributor to employment, jobs in film and video were larger than employment in broadcasting. Notably, employment in performing arts made up a substantially larger share of culture and sport employment than it did of culture and sport GDP.
Notes: culture and sport share of GDP are calculated using GDP by income, adjusted for taxes less subsidies on products and imports; employment shares calculated using job totals from labour productivity tables
Source: Statistics Canada. Table 36-10-0452-01 Culture and sport indicators by domain and sub-domain, by province and territory, product perspective (x 1,000); Table 36-10-0221-01 Gross domestic product, income-based, provincial and territorial, annual (x 1,000,000); Table 36-10-0480-01 Labour productivity and related measures by business sector industry and by non-commercial activity consistent with the industry accounts
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